Avoiding Cross Contamination in a Public Restroom
Public restrooms host a myriad of bacteria and germs. Simple items such as door handles, sink faucets and paper towel levers can be the home of viruses that can be passed on and can make you ill. The best way to avoid getting ill or transmitting a virus is to avoid cross contamination. Cross Contamination is when the bacteria and germs from one surface are transferred to another surface. This can happen when one person touches an object with dirty hands and another person comes by and touches that same object and will get those germs, viruses and disease on their hands.
The Center for Disease Control (CDC) advises the best way to avoid cross contamination is to wash hands thoroughly. Restroom facilities can help eliminate cross contamination by reducing touch points in the restroom. Touch points are basic places that are touched by the person/public, such as restroom faucet, the restroom door handles, soap dispensers, paper towel dispensers and any place a person may touch while in the restroom.
Touch-Free Paper Towel Dispensers
Touch-Free Paper Towel Dispensers are an important tool in reducing cross-contanimation. Touch-Free Paper Towel Dispensers allow the user to dispense a paper towel without touching a lever or button, thus keeping hands clean and reducing the spread of bacteria. These dispensers can either be automatic by use of a sensor or they can require the user to pull on the paper towel for use.
Automatic Hand Dryers
Automatic Hand Dryers are designed to be an efficient alternative to paper towel dispensers. These dryers help reduce paper towel waste and maintenance while also reducing the risk of cross contamination. There are several different designs of automatic hand dryer ranging from a simple wave of the hand underneath the dryer to the popular style Dualflow Plus which has the user insert hands and fully dries hands in 10-15 seconds and has an antibacterial filter treatment. The eXtremeAir® by American Dryer offer a new technology called Cold Plasma Clean which advertises that the dryer is able to kill germs naturally and sanitize and dry hands. This dryer also dries hands in 10-15 seconds.
Automatic Soap Dispensers
Automatic Soap Dispensers or Touch Free Soap Dispensers have become such a norm in public restrooms that many customers request and require an automatic soap dispenser. No one wants to touch a dispenser that someone else has used before washing their hands. These automatic soap dispensers help reduce cross contamination by eliminating the touch points of customers. These dispensers use a sensor to activate a certain amount of soap to flow for each customer. They are usually battery-operated and require very little maintenance.
Exit Towels and Foot Pulls
So you've managed to wash and dry your hands using touch free wash room devices now the frustrating part - "The Door". How do you exit the restroom without touching the door. The door can harbor as many germs if not more than the entire restroom as you never know who washed their hands before the exited and who grabbed the door handle with unwashed hands. That's where the exit towel and the foot pull come into play. The exit towel is a small dispenser that is mounted near the exit door so that a customer can pull out a towel to grab the door handle. The foot pull eliminates the need for a towel all together as it is a handle mounted and the bottom of the door that uses the customers foot to open the door. The foot pull is designed to be used with any style foot ware and can even be used with sandals.
Bradley Advocate
The Bradley Advocate all-in-one Lavatory System is a completely touch free sink, soap and dryer all in one. This not only makes your facility cleaner and reduces cross contamination it also completely eliminates paper towel trash and makes your facility safer by keeping the water off the floor. This system offers hands-free infrared .38gpm facet and infrared high speed, dual-sided hand dryer at each station.
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