Airsteril and the NHS Ambulance Service
Air Purification in Emergency Vehicle’s
Supporting 24/7 hygiene control, removing Influenzas such as COVID-19, bacteria and harmful pathogens for as little as €1.09 per day from air and surface.
Airsteril have been working with the NHS since 2015 providing air purification solutions within their Emergency Call Centre. AIRsteril units were installed at the end of September 2018 throughout the floor of their open plan office. Absenteeism data was tracked month by month from the previous calendar year with any differences recorded. This has shown a 54% reduction in absenteeism during this time. This introduction has saved this organisation thousands of pounds in covering emergency sick leave. Introducing air purification into your organisation will return its investment to you while also providing staff with a peace of mind that you are taking essential measures to protect them. Our unique air purifiers remove harmful pathogens from air and surface making us an ideal solution for open plan offices. We provide a full spectrum solution for large open plan offices, washroom solutions which eliminates air and surface pathogens alongside odours, induct solutions if you wish to provide air purification through your ventilation system and a unique Elevator range which will cover every aspect of your space.
Airsteril have also worked closely with the NHS Patient transport Services ensuring complete viral, bacterial and fungal control within their busy ambulance. As ambulances represent a front line in the NHS and have been recognized as a potential source of cross infection, placing both patients and ambulance crews at risk. The possibility of contamination begins as soon as a crew enter a vehicle and increases with every patient transferred. Ambulance personnel can protect themselves with appropriate PPE, but a combination of the relatively confined space, inadequate ventilation and level of occupation contribute to a scenario of elevated risk, with increasing air and surface contamination. The risk is particularly higher if a patient has a respiratory infection such as Coronavirus, or Tuberculosis. The interior of ambulances cannot be easily disinfected on site or between transfers, and AIRsteril have been working closely with a major UK Ambulance Trust to reduce microbial contamination in these vehicles. Rather than the reliance on periodic manual deep cleaning or airborne treatments such as hydrogen peroxide fogging, an intrinsically safe CND (Continuous Non-depleting Disinfection) process has been developed that reduces microbial contamination levels and infection risks to both patients and staff without any changes to vehicle operation. A validation was performed assessing the effect of an AIRsteril MVX12 medical unit installed in NHS Patient Transport Service (PTS) ambulances, on the levels of airborne and surface microorganisms. After 6 weeks operation, air plate and swab samples were taken as a baseline from 10 vehicles without an MVX12 unit installed and from the same sample points in 9 vehicles with the units fitted.
The results from the testing showed that the control vehicles were significantly less hygienic than the ambulances treated by CND:
• Surface contamination – a 1.32 log10cfu/cm2 reduction equating to a 95.26% decrease from control vehicle levels when using the AIRsteril unit.
• Airborne contamination – A 0.73 log10cfu/cm2 reduction equating to an 81.45% decrease from control vehicle levels when using the AIRsteril unit.
