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Staff in the emergency department at the Mater hospital must now provide and wash their own hospital uniforms - something staff say could pose an infection risk. Sam Boal/Photocall Ireland

Concerns over infection risk as Mater tells staff: 'Wash your own scrubs'

Staff at the emergency department in the Mater Hospital have been told to buy and wash their own uniforms – a system which could pose risks of cross-contamination.

MEDICAL STAFF in the emergency department at the Mater hospital have been told to buy and clean their own ‘scrubs’ as part of hospital spending cutbacks – a move some staff fear poses a major infection risk.

Staff were previously supplied with the standard blue and green uniforms, worn over their own everyday clothing, and had these washed by the hospital – but staff now have to take care of this themselves.

Aside from the expense of buying their own uniforms – which are specially embroidered with the hospital logo, and therefore cost more than a standard set of scrubs – staff have also raised concerns about possible infection hazards under the new regime.

Medical staff have voiced fears that domestic washing machines would not be suitable for removing any infection risk from a contaminated hospital uniform. TheJournal.ie understands, however, that staff have been advised not to speak to the media about the arrangements.

One source said it was “farcical” to think that medical staff could be treating someone carrying a highly infectious disease, only to have their hospital uniform “brought home to wash with our family machine”.

In a statement to TheJournal.ie the Mater said the initiative “was introduced in areas where uniforms were traditionally worn, for example emergency department, dialysis, oncology and haematology day wards.”

This had been done “in consultation and agreement with relevant staff members”, it said, adding that the initiative was the hospital’s own and not a HSE instruction. The hospital insisted, however, that there was “no infection control issue” around the new regime.

Seven-stage wash

This conflicted with advice from Professor Ronnie Russell, a microbiologist at Trinity College Dublin, who said the best practice in hospitals was to run a seven-stage wash including peracetic acid on clinical textiles, including bedsheets and pillowcases.

“The coats and the personal protective equipment [...] used by the staff during nursing obviously become contaminated and they were vehicles of transmission of disease, just as hands are,” Russell said.

“Really the odds of actually doing a decent job in a domestic washing machine are quite low,” he said.

Russell said there were scientific publications which showed that the likes of MRSA, the so-called hospital ‘superbug’, could easily survive a domestic wash.

There was also the possibility that clothing carrying an infection, while not being removed of that infection, could also cross-contaminate other garments in that wash.

Even if the wash was on a high temperature, killing any bacteria, Russell said there was a possibility of endotoxin, when dead bacteria fall into an open wound and cause irritation.

In general, Russell said best practice was for hospitals to provide appropriate changing facilities for staff, and lockers with two or three fresh uniforms for staff to use as needed.

Because some hospitals did not have facilities for changing, however, some staff might put on their uniforms at home, before they leave for work – which could also pose potential infection risks.

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51 Comments
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    Mute OU812
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    Oct 15th 2012, 7:22 AM

    Yeah, I think the Mater need to think this one through again…

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    Mute Andrew Telford
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    Oct 15th 2012, 7:25 AM

    Dr. Nick Riveria prepping for open heart surgery ‘These gloves can free with my toilet brush’

    Have some dignity… Front line Drs and nurses in the ER work 18 hour shifts dealing with desperate and anxious patient only to be vommited on and sent home to wash it out themselves…

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    Mute Micheal
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    Oct 15th 2012, 7:51 AM

    18 hour shifts? Try 24-36 hours, you might get a little hotter.

    148
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    Mute Creamy Hamstrings
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    Oct 15th 2012, 7:48 AM

    I’ve seen the level of hygene and technology used in hospital decontamination cleaning units and it’s amazing. And now they’re saying – ah sure forget all that stuff, wash your own gear!! This isn’t the under 10′s football club!

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    Mute Mark O Brien
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    Oct 15th 2012, 11:31 AM

    the under 10s football team probably don’t get a tax credit to provide and launder/maintain their kits, nurses get one for uniforms. this is not new!

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    Mute anna maria
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    Oct 15th 2012, 7:44 AM

    Telling the staff not to speak to the media worries me as it seems to be a recent trend in the public service. Front line staff are being bullied on both sides.

    209
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    Mute Micheal
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    Oct 15th 2012, 8:02 AM

    Hated by the public, bullied by employers, you could indeed be on to something there.

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    Mute Helena Hasler
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    Oct 15th 2012, 7:41 AM

    seriously? we pay back bond holders to the tune if 1 billion and then tell Dr’s and nurses to wash their own scrubs I am disgusted. There have to be other places money can be saved turn the heating down 1 degree or even 2,10c per use of the disinfectant spray makes more sense than this. How much will the sick days cost the state/hospital?

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    Mute Jesus McNeil
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    Oct 15th 2012, 9:51 AM

    Must every argument on cost saving in this country be countered with “Sure look what we are paying the bondholders?”

    29
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    Mute Helena Hasler
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    Oct 15th 2012, 10:14 AM

    ok how about 12k in unvouched expenses, 3k dry cleaning bills.

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    Mute Mark O Brien
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    Oct 15th 2012, 10:21 AM

    @jesus. Yes it should because the money paid to these bondholders comes from the tax paying citizens of this country. Tax money that is supposed to go towards things like health, so the people get what they are paying for.

    36
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    Mute Patricia M. Larkin
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    Oct 15th 2012, 7:51 AM

    My partner is an emergency nurse in Nepean hospital in Sydney with well over twenty years experience. She puts on her scrubs at home (over her underwear, not her ordinary clothes! I’m Irish and well aware Dublin’s a bit colder than here but it’s not cold in the Mater so where would you be going in two sets of clothes?!) Then she heads off and works her shift, whether it’s triage or resus or whatever in emergency that day and comes home in her uniform. It gets thrown in the laundry basket with the rest of our dirty washing. She has about seven sets of scrubs so at the end of the week, we do our normal washing like everyone else. Darks, coloureds and whites. And yes my dark blue Levi’s and her black T-shirt go in the same wash as her navy scrubs. And in Australia we always wash with cold water, never hot. That’s standard here. And never once have we got sick because of this. She has only once in the four years I have known her come home and said her scrubs were going straight in the wash on their own as her last patient that day was hep c positive and a feral aggressive piece of work who needed to be cable-tied to the bed. Nurses don’t stand around getting spewed on! They’re way too quick and busy for that. By the way I’m full of admiration for all nurses, especially emergency staff, here and at home, having to deal with mental health cases, and extreme aggression from drugs and drink. Good on our nurses. I wouldn’t do it for anything.

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    Mute Creamy Hamstrings
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    Oct 15th 2012, 7:55 AM

    And you’re not concerned about MRSA?

    85
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    Mute seamus mcdermott
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    Oct 15th 2012, 10:13 AM

    Since retirement, underwear IS my ordinary clothes. Or should that be “…underwear ARE…”?

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    Mute Eimear Smith
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    Oct 15th 2012, 12:45 PM

    Patricia, I couldn’t imagine doing that. I’ve been nursing 15 years and the first thing you want to do after working a shift is to get the uniform off BEFORE going home. Not sit in my car/ get a bus or train home in it. Personally i think we should all be wearing scrubs in the hospital, put them on when you get in and dump them in the laundry after your shift. And do away with the minute uniform allowance we get to help fund it.

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    Mute Morgan C.Jones
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    Oct 15th 2012, 8:47 AM

    And yet deadweights in the oireachtais get to claim for dry cleaning etc

    75
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    Mute seamus mcdermott
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    Oct 15th 2012, 8:04 AM

    …and to save money on fuel costs, we won’t be buying diesel for the emergency generators.
    We’ve found a few other areas where we can cut. No more light switches. Unscrew the bulbs from now on.
    Staff will only be allowed to take lifts that are travelling up–this is to offset the mass of the counterweight, which weighs more than the lift car. All “Down” direction lift call buttons are now disabled.
    We can save 25% on trolley maintenance by removing one wheel from each trolley. All surgical packs will henceforth be sterilized at 55C to cut energy costs. We will only be using 4% O2 with nitrous oxide in anesthesia instead of 20%.
    Stay tuned for more cost-cutting proclamations..

    66
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    Mute Andrew Telford
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    Oct 15th 2012, 8:57 AM

    Ahhh man… You could save the HSE billions. Have you ever noticed all the shit that gets thrown away in hosipitals, It’s true I swear they only use those needles ONCE, the gloves too

    84
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    Mute ben eustace
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    Oct 15th 2012, 8:56 AM

    I saw an ad on tv yesterday where a woman with a brain damaged child was holding up a card asking for five euro donations so she could have help to bring him home. What is happening to our country? Who is leading us? That sick children have to beg for help and the doctors and nurses trying to help are treated like this? If the country is in such a state of emergency why don’t we have a plan in place to help our most precious citizens?On a sinking ship the children are put on lifeboats first and the captain is off last?

    62
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    Mute gingerman
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    Oct 15th 2012, 8:03 AM

    Public service staff should never speak to the media. The media are helping to decimate public service. Why make it easier for them. I am still amazed when I meet public servants who buy newspapers. They shouldnt give over their hard earned to support the trash mongers

    61
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    Mute Maria Cassin
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    Oct 15th 2012, 9:09 AM

    I’m a nurse and I work in the ER and have always had to wash my own uniforms,we wear aprons and gowns to cover our scrubs so seriously people it’s not the end of the world.
    There are a lot of other far worse cut backs going on out there .

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    Mute Patricia M. Larkin
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    Oct 15th 2012, 9:14 AM

    Sense at last! More wisdom from the mouth of a nurse than from many others!

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    Mute Jay funk
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    Oct 15th 2012, 9:42 AM

    Which hospital do you work in?

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    Mute Maria Cassin
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    Oct 15th 2012, 9:51 AM

    @ Jay Funk, I’ve worked in different hospitals in Ireland, London and the Middle East

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    Mute Kieran Crosbie Staunton
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    Oct 15th 2012, 8:57 AM

    Nurses have had to do this for how many years at this stage??? Is it in the news now because it involves doctors?

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    Mute Jay funk
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    Oct 15th 2012, 9:41 AM

    No this is both doctors and nurses in the mater who both previously had the hospital clean the uniforms. Where in the article does this say it was only doctors. You are trying the old doctors get good pay, bla bla bla. This story is about patient safety

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    Mute Kieran Crosbie Staunton
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    Oct 15th 2012, 9:52 AM

    Actually, my family are pretty much involved in all tiers of the medical profession so I certainly do not think about doctors in this light. Nurses in the Mater hospital have had to buy their own uniforms for the past few years and it is on them to ensure they are clean when going to work. The fact that doctors are now thrown into the loop of having to ensure clean garments it seems to have made public news!!

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    Mute Ian Martin
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    Oct 15th 2012, 8:06 AM

    What about the risk posed to the nurses own family from contaminated uniforms ?

    55
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    Mute Creamy Hamstrings
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    Oct 15th 2012, 8:20 AM

    Nevermind that. Priority No.1 is to keep the bondholders happy. Now be a good boy and dont question ze system!

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    Mute Patricia M. Larkin
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    Oct 15th 2012, 8:25 AM

    Unless we’re talking about highly infectious diseases like Ebola it’s really not as big a deal as some people make it out to be. They’d (ebola for example) be in isolation anyway. A lot of stuff going on in the departments particularly named in the article is not infectious. Heart attacks, dialysis, broken legs, etc. Anyway I’m new to all this twitter stuff etc so please be nice if my reply goes under the wrong comment! Nice to stay in touch with home.

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    Mute seamus mcdermott
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    Oct 15th 2012, 10:18 AM

    Two degrees? Nursing and microbiology?

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    Mute Mark O Brien
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    Oct 15th 2012, 11:20 AM

    nurses usually have to wash their own uniforms. if you work on a ward you buy and launder your own. and those beds on the ward are filled by people who started off in a&e, so if there was an infection risk in a&e its still present!

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    Mute Patricia M. Larkin
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    Oct 15th 2012, 7:57 AM

    Not in the slightest. Neither of us is walking around with open wounds.

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    Mute Creamy Hamstrings
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    Oct 15th 2012, 8:07 AM

    Good to hear..

    27
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    Mute Brendan Harlowe
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    Oct 15th 2012, 9:16 AM

    You may not be walking around with open wounds but what about the patients ? True nurses don’t move around getting spewed on but god knows where some people’s hands have been … And the point of this is that MRSA can survive a wash and be re introduced. However most hospitals I know don’t provide a scrub washing service except in specialist areas!

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    Mute Barry O'Brien
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    Oct 15th 2012, 9:04 AM

    I’m not one to usually jump in with the mob for mass anger but I honestly think this is outrageous. I don’t even know where to begin explaining how wrong this is.

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    Mute Cy hendrix
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    Oct 15th 2012, 10:19 AM

    What next?…..’Can I borrow your scalpel this afternoon ,I need one for a heart transplant operation.Oh by the way,Dr Murphy has some O neg he can lend you till friday.’

    14
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    Mute Andrew Telford
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    Oct 15th 2012, 2:27 PM

    Sure mate, it’s a lil rusty but budget cuts you know… Been meaning to request a new one but one of the the three levels of middle management I need to approve it is always on strike or holidays.

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    Mute Darren Swan
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    Oct 15th 2012, 9:32 AM

    the staff should tell management,”I’m no Superman” :)

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    Mute Patricia M. Larkin
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    Oct 15th 2012, 8:05 AM

    MRSA is normally transmitted during surgery/operation, not walking around the ED…

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    Mute Creamy Hamstrings
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    Oct 15th 2012, 8:08 AM

    Not always.

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    Mute Andrea Rock Massey
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    Oct 15th 2012, 9:09 AM

    Tell that to the parents of the newborns that have contracted it here recently.

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    Mute Barry O'Brien
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    Oct 15th 2012, 10:24 AM

    Andrea, newborns here didn’t contract it recently. It was found on their skin. That doesn’t mean they’re infected and many people carry it on their skin.

    To the OP, I had MRSA earlier this year and didn’t get it through surgery but in ICU.

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    Mute Andrea Rock Massey
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    Oct 15th 2012, 2:03 PM

    Oh, that is much better so. It was only found on their skin. Still not good enough if you ask me. I have had 3 children and MRSA was never found on any of their skin or any other babies I have known.

    My oldest brother did actually contract MRSA about 6 years ago in one of our main hospitals. This would never have happened during the reign of the ward sister…

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    Mute Barry O'Brien
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    Oct 15th 2012, 2:10 PM

    Yes, it is much better, because it’s pretty normal for many people to carry MRSA. MRSA is benign to carriers, it’s when someone gets infected is where the problem starts. If it gets into the bloodstream it can cause blood poisoning. If you want to read about my experience with MRSA go back a few days here on the journal and read my comments on the story about the babies carrying MRSA. Although I was indescribably sick, the worst experience of my life, I don’t blame the hospital or staff, because it’s just the nature of MRSA, and you or your brother shouldn’t be blaming the hospital or staff either. If you want to blame anything blame evolution because it is natural selection that allowed the antibiotic resistant strains of MRSA to survive while the weaker bacteria was killed off.

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    Mute Mark O Brien
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    Oct 15th 2012, 2:17 PM

    @Andrea, you know we still have ward sisters?? do yeah, it does happen during their “reign”…

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    Mute Kevin Duffy
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    Oct 15th 2012, 8:39 PM

    Wrong

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    Mute Rusty Balls
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    Oct 15th 2012, 8:57 PM

    @Andrea The newborns babies in were found to have MRSA on their skin, none of them were showing symptoms of actually an MRSA infection, their infection will be easily treated with creams and washes. Earlier this year sveral babies did die from another outbreak in a Belfast hospital, in that case it was found to be from a bug called pseudomanas aeruginosa, this can be a lot worse than MRSA and has a 40-60% mortality rate, basically when you get this you have it for life. It is extremely difficult to kill the bacteria outside the body and even more so once it gets inside. In the Belfast case it was eventually trace to taps.
    Pseudomanas is especially dangerous to people with Cystic Fibrosis or any respiratory condition, believe me I know. I have a chronic respiratory condition, I had MRSA a few years ago and eventually got rid of it, I currently have Pseudomonas and MRSA again.
    I was in my local hospital again today getting bloods done and asked some of the staff about this, one of the cleaners told me, given the nature of what they do, the HSE used to supply their uniforms and safety shoes but this stopped about 6 or 7 years ago, they always had to launder their own uniforms. He said they now have to buy their own, as do nurses and porters. He told me they have a tiny shoebox sized locker, over 100 people share these lockers in a tiny room and share a toilet with the female changing room next door. I found it hard to believe. So he showed me. I should have taken a picture, you couldn’t stretch out and touch both walls, because there wasn’t enough room, a tiny room lined with locker, tiny shoebox sized locker in which everything they have must be stuffed. The wee (pardon the pun) toilet had two doors, one to the gents changing room and one to the female changing room. One lock was broken. If you tried to swing a cat there’d be blood stains on the walls.
    I asked about the story I heard on the news this morning, those 8 Fine Gael TD’s who want the increments of high pay Public Servants tackled. He opened his locker and handed me a pay slip, I won’t say what he got but he was definitely NOT getting any increments and said if they want to take them off the lower paid staff, they’ll have to give them to those staff first.

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    Mute Frank2521
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    Oct 15th 2012, 2:44 PM

    Most people wash their own working clothes – what is the big deal? There are more serious issues with the infection control in hospitals than washing a few uniforms.

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    Mute Rusty Balls
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    Oct 15th 2012, 9:27 PM

    From what I’ve been told most hospital staff buy and launder their own uniforms, but in some areas where scrubs are worn, such as A&E Departments, the scrubs are worn for a reason and should be washed by the hospital. I’ve heard of some members of staff having to change their scrubs mid shift as someone puked, crapped or got blood all over them.
    I was on a ward once when there was a C Diff outbreak, all the staff immeadiately changed into scrubs, doctors, nurses, cleaners, porters etc. and the ward was closed. They changed out of the scrubs into their ordinary clothes before leaving and those scrubs were laundered by the hospital, it was very efficient and impressive, and it worked.

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    Mute mumatwork
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    Jul 17th 2013, 9:27 AM

    I’d love to know who in HSE doesn’t wash own uniforms
    I certainly do- no option and I work in an intensive care unit.
    You get tax relief to supply and launder own uniforms
    Only place I know is theatre who wear scrubs

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