Breast milk messes in the NICU

[NICU RN 7]

I'm working on a practice change for our unit with regard to the human milk spills that are a normal part of pumping for and feeding infants.  The obvious solution is to wipe them with paper towels and then sanitize the area, but what do you do when the spot is dried before you see it?  Our mothers pump at bedside, and we are often faced with dried spots of milk on the plastic chairs and bedside shelves after mothers have left.  Our sanitizers: Sani-Cloth and Oxycide, do not lift the milkfat, and one of them even crystalizes it, making removal extremely difficult.My questions are as follows:

1. What does your infection control say about spilled milk?

2. What solutions do you use to clean dried spilled milk

3. Whose responsibility is it to clean such spots?  Environmental services, Nutrition, Nursing, Parents?

 

 

[Stefan Johansson]

Relevant questions indeed!

I will check with our nursing care specialist also but I think our replies (Sachs Childrens, Stockholm/Swe) are

1. regular hygien guidelines apply, i.e. cleaning with surface alcohol detergent on paper cloth
2. our surface alcohol detergent (70% alc)
3. nursing and our cleaning staff share responsibility for all cleaning (but parents commonly help out too)

[gayle omansky]

Hi! We do not find dried spots frequently but our “hard surface wipes” which are also 70% alcohol will clean them up at least to the naked eye. Nurses clean occupied bed spaces & housekeeping comes to thoroughly clean vacated spaces with different solutions.

[J Campbell]

I've found that Medela quick clean breastmilk removal soap works well for this.