'But it Works at Home'
The argument against consumer grade products in clinical settings
By Nancy Andrews, RDH, BS
Dental offices may seek low cost alternatives to professional products. For infection control, this is especially unwise. Professional products are safer, more effective and more appropriate than consumer grade products. They are designed to meet clinical standards. Home-use products may appear to be the same as professional products, but they may not reliably meet the needs of patient care. Infection control is too important to be less than absolutely sure.
If customers buy consumer grade products, they may assume risk knowingly or unknowingly - and the whole industry loses. Be on the look-out for non-professional product use, especially where costs are the major driver for purchases. If you can help customers understand the negative aspects of going out of the healthcare industry for infection control supplies, you will have empowered them - and your business.
With the understanding that not all professionally sold products are great, or even appropriate for some situations, the ideas here are generally useful to differentiate (quality) healthcare products from non-healthcare products.
Go with the pros
The following are talking points you can use with customers to help them understand why professional products are better than home-use products - based on safety and practicality:
- Healthcare providers are required to correctly use products capable of meeting professional standards. Customers are safer if products are designed to meet those standards.
- Professional products are generally safer and more effective because they are developed specifically for healthcare, and must pass regulatory testing for safety and efficacy to be sold with label claims. (Home-use products are not intended for healthcare settings.)
- Customers are legally and ethically liable for worker and patient safety. The products that are approved for healthcare with regulatory clearance and scientific validations provide obvious insurance against product failure.
- Consumer grade products may or may not be effective in controlling pathogen transmission in clinical environments when used under the high demands of patient treatment with time constraints. Customers cannot afford to be unsure!
- The quality of healthcare products is more strictly controlled than consumer grade products. These stricter standards protect workers and patients, and also make sure the products are more appropriate and useful.
- Quality professional products are designed to be used repeatedly and quickly, according to healthcare standards with minimal risk to surfaces or people. These products will have fewer problems than consumer grade products that were not designed specifically for clinical use.
- Quality professional products have reliable vendor support, aided by industry distribution partners. This is vital to healthcare managers: it’s not just about products - it’s about having access to help, guidance and information to make those products successful. Similar support for consumer grade products is not likely.
- Home-use products may damage or alter surfaces, irritate or compromise workers or be difficult to manage quickly and correctly.
- Consumer grade products may appear to be safe and effective, but may not be. Home-use packaging and labels may look like professional products but have different ingredients, lack appropriate EPA or FDA registration, and fail to perform. Use-directions of consumer grade products may be confusing or even contradict professional guidelines. Such problems can result in poor compliance, or even failure to control infection.
- Compliance and safe practices are easier and more likely while using products designed specifically for healthcare.
Hand hygiene products
The 2003 Centers for Disease Control Infection Control Guidelines stated: "Dental healthcare workers should choose from commercially available healthcare provider handwashes when selecting agents for hand antisepsis or surgical hand antisepsis." Customers have reasonable assurance that professional hand hygiene products are safe, effective and practical because they must meet regulatory standards for clinical use, and labels state ingredients and effectiveness information. Further, if these products are from reliable vendors, sufficient research and testing information is available and customer support is available.
Healthcare hand hygiene products are better than consumer grade products because they are more likely to be designed to optimize:
- Fast action. Use-directions should state required contact time for effectiveness.
- Broad (and targeted) antimicrobial spectrum of activity. (stated on label)
- Availability of persistent antimicrobial activity for surgical use.
- Aseptic, reliable delivery. Dispensers are available in non-touch or cleanable designs, and deliver an effective dose consistently. (All soap containers can become contaminated inside. Clean before refilling; use aseptic technique.)
Healthcare hand hygiene products should optimize skin protection in the following ways:
- Products should have enough emollients to protect skin under heavy demands of healthcare use.
- Emollients should be non-petroleum-based for rapid skin absorption and to avoid degrading latex gloves.
- Products should be hypo-allergenic and non-irritating.
- In professional soaps, lotions and hand sanitizers, ingredients are selected and combined specifically for frequent and repeated clinical use, to protect skin.
- Healthcare hand hygiene products should be less irritating to hands than home-use hand products.
Surface disinfection products
Customers can get confused because cleaners and disinfectants are made by many of the same companies for both home and healthcare use, and the labels may look very similar. Customers may not be aware that the EPA numbers, ingredients or formulas for consumer grade products are not appropriate for clinical use.
Professional surface cleaning/disinfection products are safer, more effective and more practical than consumer grade products because they are more likely to be:
- EPA registered for healthcare use.
- Effective against organisms identified as important for patient care settings: "hospital disinfectant" (effective against Salmonella, Staphylococcus and Pseudomonas test organisms), or "intermediate-level disinfectant." (tuberculocidal)
- Compatible with; surfaces, conditions of use, staff, and other asepsis products being used.
- Both an effective cleaner and disinfectant. (For easier inventory and compliance management)
- Hypo-allergenic.
- Easy to use with clear instructions.
- Effective with reasonable contact time for clinical use.
- Able to be stored, disposed of reasonably, with acceptable shelf life and use life.
- Supported by sales reps to guide and oversee an integrated system of products with known properties, precautions and results. Customers who buy consumer grade products are likely to end up with many different products. This inconsistency can be difficult or impossible to manage and mixing different active ingredients and practices may be hazardous.
Professional products are safer, more effective and more practical than going outside the healthcare industry because of all the regulations, research, industry support, and validation that healthcare products have. Infection control is too important to cut corners - even in hard economic times.
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