More Learning

All of us patients watch the cleaning ladies at work from our beds. We shake our heads when we see them simply mop the floor with one wash of the broom and a five-minute quick swing of the mop on the general areas.

When they wash the toilets, those of us with beds in front of the toilets can see so clearly what they do: They wash the floor without using the floor brushes they carry with them. They stand at one side of the toilet as if they were gardeners watering potted plants. Motionless, they spray water with the washing tube to try to wash away the shoe prints and dirt on the floor. They don’t bother with using the floor cleaning solutions and sanitizing solutions in their buckets or scrub the floor with the floor brushes properly. As a result, the tile edges are dark with molds and a waft of stinky rotten smells come onto you when you walk into the toilet. You feel like puking.

When they wash the toilet bowls, they do the same thing—spraying water all over and into the toilet bowl. This is why the toilet bowls have brown stains because they hardly use their brushes. The sink is also sprayed with water instead of being washed with cleaning solutions. The upper  edge with the wall has a line of black mold. The white washing tube is dark with mold. When they are supposed to use a piece of cloth with anti-bacterial solutions to wipe our table surfaces and our bed railings, they do it so fast that we laugh.

 Dirty Toilets in the hospital.

This is why the toilets are smelly and moldy and chokingly awful especially during weekends.

Things may change for a few days if we complain.

I made my first complaint to the Head Nurse. “We are all taking antibiotics because we keep getting infections from the ward. The cleanliness of the ward has to do with the cleaning lady. Look at the this toilet, “ I showed her our filthy toilet.  “It is only 11 am and it is so dirty because the cleaning lady didn’t really clean it except spraying water.”

Then the cleaning lady came in, she said as she walked past our beds, “So much work to do to serve all these princesses.” She banged the toilet seat, sprayed the water all over the toilet until our towels were wet.

But the toilet was cleaner than before.

Close-up of mould on the plaster around the sink

Mould on the floor.

  

  

How can we not get bacteria infection with mould like these in the toilets?

Mould on toilet walls

It doesn’t seem that she has been trained properly to   understand bacteria and patients and how to clean a hospital   toilet.  There are many diseases caused by moulds. Also the cleaning contractor’s supervisor who sometimes walks around, can’t he see with his own eyes? Doesn’t he do a spot check?   Doesn’t he realize that cleaning solutions are not used?   Unless the cleaning solutions go somewhere else…..

Don’t they have internal audit for such a multimillion dollar contract? Don’t the hospital administrators do spot checks on  the contractors? Why don’t they ever install a feedback  system from patients as to the quality of the service? I am sure many patients and their families have seen with the own eyes how dirty the toilets and wards are. Does one have to keep complaining to get the rights in the patient’s charter?Don’t contractors who receive multimillion contracts implement the terms agreed well before they get another renewal? 

How can a cleaning company with a multimillion dollar contract to clean a hospital does not know that using white vinegar will get rid of the mould? If the company wants to maximize its profit by not buying mould cleaning solutions in the market, then use vinegar as it is a low cost, non-allergic solution.

I don’t understand.

But as a patient, I can only wonder.   

By Ching Ching