Bring Your Own Mop

Not that I'm fond of hospitals, but the uncle was recovering from his second heart attack and we went to cheer him up.

The cleaning lady came through while we were chatting, so we danced around her mop. Next thing, she's going after every flat surface with a dust cloth and then it was time to wipe down all solid objects that might have come into contact with a patient. The room was spotless when we arrived, and it was even more spotless when we left.

Contrast that with a recent inspection tour of Irish hospitals, which resulted in poor ratings when it came to hygiene. Should you fall ill in Ireland, you'd best be advised to bring along your cleaning supplies, because the cleaners don't clean very well.

Reports of dusty beds, dusty pipes and dusty floors is bad enough. Recovered or not, you'd want to be released as soon as possible, before dust bunnies landed in your recently sutured wounds. Far worse to learn that the intravenous pumps aren't being cleaned. You'd rip out your own I.V. rather than risk getting an infection from the previous user.

A recent assessment of hospital hygiene determined that no one is minding the store when it comes to the cleaning crews. They are paid to clean, and management assumes that the job gets down. Obviously, no one from management ever walks into a ward to look under the beds or verify in any way that hospital patients were getting what their taxes paid for.

Just another joy of national health care. Bring along your own mop, and if you can afford it, you'd want to provide your own medical supplies and equipment.