Last November, the Leapfrog Group released an independent study on 2023 Hospital Safety Grades. Their study found that since the pandemic, infection rates in hospitals have dramatically improved. However, there is still work to be done in many states, and that work begins by improving basic cleaning and disinfecting procedures for patient rooms and communal areas.

The Buckeye Prescription Training Program can standardize cleaning and disinfecting in your hospital to keep patient, staff, and visitors healthy.

Patient Room Cleaning with Prescription

Prescription breaks down cleaning into manageable steps for EVS staff, covering all areas of the hospital including hallways, restrooms, and lobby areas. However, the most important room is the patient room. It must be cleaned properly to prevent cross infection during and between hospital stays.

Patient Rooms fall into 1 of 5 categories:

Occupied – the patient is in the room.

Discharge – the patient has just been discharged.

Unoccupied – the room remains vacant after discharge cleaning.

Isolation – the room is occupied by a patient requiring isolation precautions. 

Discharge Isolation – isolation patient has just been discharged.

Patient Room Cleaning Procedures 

The Prescription website and manual cover each of these scenarios in detail, following 6 basic cleaning procedures.

1. Empty Trash
2. High Dust
3. Damp Wipe
4. Clean Restrooms
5. Dust Mop or Sweep
6. Damp Mop

To help guide EVS staff, Prescription offers customizable wall charts and tools. Download our sample wall chart to help remind your staff about proper procedures in patient rooms.

The Complete Prescription Program 

Routine cleaning is only part of keeping a hospital clean. The Prescription program provides training in routine cleaning, patient room cleaning, surgery room cleaning, restroom, carpet care, hard floor care, and product safety.

Each video breaks down the procedures and equipment needed for each custodial task. The Prescription website serves as an online EVS training manual with resources including wall charts, Safety Data Sheets (SDS), product literature, and more. Your EVS staff will have 24/7 access to all of the tools they need to keep your hospital clean.

Contact a Buckeye representative to learn about all Prescription features and resources.

Knowing the proper procedures to keep a school clean is important for the safety of students and staff, but finding effective training for custodians can be a difficult job. The Buckeye Honors^® Custodial Training Program for Schools and Universities offers standardized procedures to help clean any area of your school or university.

Routine Cleaning Procedures with Honors

Honors has broken down routine cleaning into 5 simple steps.

1. High Dust

Clean each room in a clockwise pattern from high to low until all surfaces have been dusted.

2. Spot Clean/Remove Graffiti

Spot clean all nonporous surfaces with Buckeye Eco® All-Purpose Cleaner E11.

Clean glass and dry erase boards with Buckeye Eco Multi-Purpose Glass Cleaner E13. 

Spray tough soils with Buckeye Eco Muscle Cleaner E14. Let it dwell for 3 minutes. For stubborn stains, agitate the area and then wipe it clean with a paper towel or microfiber cloth. 

3. Dust Mop or Sweep

Sweep and scrape up items stuck to the floor with a putty knife before dust mopping, being careful not to gouge the floor.

4. Empty Trash

Avoid pushing down on the trash as there may be sharp objects in the trash bag.

5. Damp Mop

Post “Wet Floor” signs at the area entrance. Outline the area with a damp mop and fill using a figure-8 technique.

Download our wall chart to help guide the cleaning process.

The Complete Honors Program

Routine cleaning is only part of keeping a school clean. The Honors Program provides training in routine cleaning, restroom, shower and locker room cleaning, carpet care, hard floor care, gym floor care, food service procedures, summer cleaning procedures, and product safety.

Each video breaks down the procedures and equipment needed for each custodial task. The Honors website serves as an online custodial training manual with resources including wall charts, Safety Data Sheets (SDS), product literature, and more. Your custodial staff will have 24/7 access to all of the tools they need to keep your school clean.

Honors also offers reporting, testing, and surveys to monitor the level of cleanliness in your facilities. Contact a Buckeye representative to learn about all Honors features and resources.

With cafeterias, restrooms, locker rooms, classrooms, gymnasiums, and hallways, maintaining a high standard of cleanliness in all areas of a school is challenging. Having the right tools to keep schools clean for students is a major component of a successful maintenance program. If your custodial team spans across multiple facilities, Buckeye Honors® is a great tool that can help you keep track of training and monitor the needs of each facility.

Surveys

With customizable surveys, Honors makes it easy to track the progress made in each of your school’s facilities. These surveys allow you to evaluate the cleanliness of parts of your facility. They are customizable, giving you the option to rate specific classrooms, school grounds, locker rooms, and more.

Staff can:
Rate the area being surveyed from 1-5
Upload photos of the area
Leave comments and concerns

For school districts and universities that need to monitor several facilities, Honors surveys make it easy to assess the cleanliness of all areas.

Additional Features

Honors serves as a training website for custodial staff of schools and universities. It provides 24-hour access to resources including training videos, posters, wall charts, PowerPoints, and checklists. With Honors training videos, your staff will gain a complete understanding of proper daily, interim, and restorative maintenance procedures. You can also test new trainees on these procedures and review their answers with the Honors reporting system.

Honors can help you standardize your maintenance procedures across your school, school district, or university. Contact your Buckeye representative to learn more.

Combatting the spread of HAIs (healthcare associated infections) in healthcare facilities is a complex task that requires a multi-faceted approach. Hospitals and other healthcare facilities require an effective cleaning and maintenance program to protect staff, visitors, and patients from the spread of germs and illness.

Hand Hygiene 

The CDC states that hand hygiene is one of the most important steps in reducing the spread of germs. Making hand sanitizer and hand washes readily available to staff and visitors can help reduce the risk of the spread of germs, but there are other ways an effective hand hygiene program can combat disease.

In addition to top-of-the-line products, offering education and awareness materials alongside behavior modification tools that inspire immediate hand hygiene practices can increase compliance rates in healthcare facilities.

The Symmetry^® Hand Hygiene Program offers those tools and more. Symmetry’s Point of Care tools make hand hygiene available when it’s needed most. For example, the 50 ml Tray Table/W.O.W. Clip puts sanitizer right at the patient’s bedside for easy access before and after patient care.

Cleaning and Disinfecting 

Proper cleaning and disinfecting procedures can have a huge impact on the spread of germs in any healthcare facility. The Buckeye Eco^® Proportioning Program simplifies cleaning and disinfecting with automatic dilution, ensuring important products like disinfectants are properly diluted every time.

Eco products include cleaners, disinfectants, and sanitizers for every surface in a hospital or healthcare facility. EPA expects products on List N to kill all strains and variants of the coronavirus SARS-CoV-2 (COVID-19) when used according to the label directions. All Eco disinfectants are on List-N.

However, a cleaning program is not complete without the proper training. Cleaning and disinfecting procedures need to be followed carefully so areas like patient rooms and hospital waiting rooms remain free of germs. To ensure hospital staff have access to the information they need, Buckeye created the Prescription Training Program.

Prescription is a complete maintenance program for hospitals that presents the products, procedures, and training needed to meet your facility’s highest standards. The Prescription program provides training in routine cleaning, patient room cleaning, surgery room cleaning, restroom, carpet care, hard floor care, and product safety. This program and its resources are available online, 24 hours a day.

Reducing the spread of HAIs is a constant battle. Make sure the people in your healthcare facility have access to the tools they need to combat illness. Contact your local sales representative to learn more.

During the winter months, respiratory diseases like COVID-19, influenza, and RSV are spread more easily. Implementing an effective cleaning and disinfecting program can reduce the spread of germs. The Eco Proportioning Program is equipped with multi-purpose disinfectants that remove soil and effectively kill a wide array of organisms.

Eco Disinfectants

Eco One-Step Disinfectant/Deodorizer/Cleaner E22 cleans, disinfects, and deodorizes in one step. This hospital-use disinfectant is bactericidal, virucidal, and fungicidal.

Eco Neutral Disinfectant E23 is a multipurpose disinfectant designed for use in hospital, healthcare, and industrial settings. It is ideal for routine cleaning and floor care maintenance.

E22 and E23 may both be used against SARS-Related Coronavirus 2 (SARSCoV-2) [cause of COVID-19] with a one-minute contact time at a ½ oz./gal. dilution rate.

Proper Disinfection Can:

Combat absenteeism in schools
Reduce HAIs (healthcare-associated-infections) in healthcare facilities
Create a safer environment for retail customers and staff

In-Person and Online Training

Buckeye offers in-person and online training for all products and programs, ensuring your staff has the tools they need to keep your facility clean and looking its best. Complement in-person training with the Honors®  Custodial Training Program for Schools and Universities, or the Prescription Hospital Environmental Services Maintenance Program. Honors and Prescription training videos cover routine, interim, and restorative maintenance procedures. Both platforms include additional resources like PowerPoints, wall charts, and posters. Users can take tests to assess their knowledge at the end of each video and supervisors can monitor test scores from the reports page. With new videos detailing enhanced disinfecting procedures, Honors and Prescription can help keep your staff informed.

The Eco Proportioning Program 

Eco disinfectants are part of the Eco Proportioning Program. The Eco Proportioning Program utilizes proportioning systems to automatically dilute products at the correct rate, removing guesswork from the process.

Eco’s extensive line of super concentrated products includes disinfectants, cleaners, sanitizers, and more. With effective, ecologically friendly chemistry, Eco products are designed to protect workers and preserve the environment.

To learn more about Eco disinfectants and the complete Eco Proportioning Program, contact your Buckeye representative.

With a commitment to developing products that are safer for workers and the environment, Buckeye established itself as “green” long before it became a marketing strategy. For Buckeye, sustainability means providing the most innovative, high performance and cost effective products, packaging, and programs that promote human health and safety.

Products

Green Seal™ Certified Products

Many Buckeye products are Green Seal certified. These products are safer for the worker and environment without compromising product performance. Our Green Seal certified products not only outperform other green products, they also outperform non-green conventional chemistries.

“Green Seal is an independent non-profit organization dedicated to safeguarding the environment and transforming the marketplace by promoting the manufacture, purchase, and use of environmentally responsible products and services.”

Liquescent Technology

To eliminate hazardous ingredients like butyl, solvents, and alcohol bases, Buckeye developed Liquescent technology. This water-based technology has allowed Buckeye to manufacture high-performance products while adhering to our principle of human health and safety.

R-Fit Liners

Gateway’s R-Fit liners are made with the highest quality resins to create lighter, stronger liners with less plastic. They are designed to fit specific trash can sizes, further reducing plastic waste. On average, Gateway customers reduced the amount of plastic reaching landfills by 39%.

Wood Floor Coatings

Reflections Wood Floor Coatings do not require crosslinkers, which contain polyfunctional aziridene. This crosslinker is used by other manufacturers to increase durability, but it has respiratory and nervous system health implications. In fact, many manufacturers that use polyfunctional aziridine warn consumers that it should be treated as a potential carcinogen.

Packaging

Eco and Symmetry 1.25 L bags are manufactured with 83% less plastic than rigid containers. Because our products work more efficiently and our packaging is recyclable and biodegradable, you use less product, and therefore less waste ends up in landfills.

Eco outer box packaging is also made with 41% recycled material, recyclable, and double wall corrugated. Eco inner carton packaging is made from 100% recycled paperboard and 35% post-consumer material.

Dilution Control Programs

Our dilution control systems eliminate direct contact with product and ensure our concentrated products are being used according to manufacturer specifications. Our products, packaging, and dilution control systems are also color and number coded to make them easier and safer for employees to use.

Training

Buckeye programs come with specialized training that focuses on worker and environmental safety. With standardized procedures that reduce product usage, labor, and overall cost, Buckeye is committed to enhancing product performance and safety.

Contact your representative to see how Buckeye programs can improve worker and environmental safety in your facility.

Buckeye has always emphasized complete cleaning programs over individual products. With a complete program, maintenance staff receive all of the resources and training they need to keep facilities looking their best. Each Buckeye program is equipped with training materials that standardize cleaning procedures and promote human health and environmental safety.

Buckeye’s in-person training is offered by market-specific representatives. These representatives receive specialized training and can expertly advise on maintenance issues from cleaning and disinfecting to floor care and hand hygiene. Each of Buckeye’s maintenance programs also comes with tools and resources like posters, signs, and wall charts to assist staff with proper procedures and product identification.

To compliment in-person training, Buckeye offers market-specific training programs for schools, hospitals, long-term care facilities, retail facilities, correctional facilities, and gyms. These training programs include step-by-step instructional videos, detailed yet clearly presented procedure manuals, and easy-to-follow wall charts or flip charts.

The Buckeye Honors^® Custodial Training Program for schools and universities is the most advanced of Buckeye’s training programs, providing 24/7 access to videos and training material at buckeyehonors.com. These videos and materials are accompanied by tests that asses knowledge of procedures. Administrators can then view reporting on team member test scores. 

Honors provides additional resources like customizable PowerPoint presentations, training manuals, Safety Data Sheets (SDS), product literature, and wall charts. The website also includes a surveys feature, allowing admins to assess the current state of a school or university.

No matter the facility or maintenance needs, Buckeye has the resources and training materials necessary to produce excellent results. Contact your local representative for more information about Buckeye training programs.

Oftentimes, facility maintenance managers will hire contractors to recoat their gyms floors. Because wood floors can be one of the most expensive floors in a facility, staff members don’t want to risk damaging them with improper equipment and inexperience. While recoating a wood floor does require a specific skillset, Reflections has experienced representatives who can train facility maintenance staff to recoat wood floors without compromising their quality, durability, and beauty.

Wood floor contractors can be a costly expense. By training staff members to recoat wood floors in house, facilities can cut down on costs. In person and online training are available through the Reflections Wood Floor Program to train staff members on proper technique, equipment, and products.

The Reflections^® Wood Floor Program can help facilities get the most out of their wood floors. With products and procedures that can extend the life and beauty of your wood floors, Reflections creates a custom program for each facility’s unique needs. Reflections representatives assess the floor, noting things like the age of the floor, damaged areas, and previous maintenance procedures in order to create the best program for that facility.

Because the Reflections program uses equipment most facilities already have, there are no added equipment costs. Training, both in person and online, can make recoating your wood floors easier, and in some cases, faster. Reflections water-based wood floor coatings allow for light sports play on gym floors only 48 hours after recoating.

For added protection, Arena^® 300 Microban^® Antimicrobial Wood Floor Coating utilizes Microban antimicrobial product protection to help inhibit the growth of bacteria. Microban protection is built into Arena 300 during the manufacturing process. When microbes come in contact with the product surface, Microban protection penetrates the cell wall of the microorganism and disrupts the cell, making the microorganism unable to grow and reproduce.

Once a floor has been recoated, Reflections will help facilities maintain their floors between recoats. In addition to in-person training, staff members have access to wall charts, literature, and videos that can guide them through each maintenance process. The Honors^® Custodial Training Program for Schools and Universities can also help guide staff members through each process with videos, PowerPoints, and literature. Honors is available 24/7 online, and comes with additional features like tests and reporting.

Make wood floor maintenance a priority this summer. Contact your local representative to schedule a Buckeye Reflections product demonstration or host a wood floor seminar at your facility.

The Reflections^® Wood Floor Program is built around meeting and exceeding tough environmental regulations, and manufacturing products that are easier and safer for employees to use, while also meeting the stringent expectations of Facility Administrators.

Health Safety Features

Reflections wood floor coatings do not require crosslinkers, which contain polyfunctional aziridene. Other manufacturers use this raw material to crosslink their products for durability. Unfortunately, this crosslinker can have a negative impact on the health of employees and visitors, including respiratory and nervous system health implications.

All Reflections wood floor coatings meet the strict VOC regulations of each state and are single component, 100% urethane products. Using 100% urethane products significantly improves indoor air quality, worker and visitor health safety, and reduces mixing mistakes and overall costs. 

Urethane Wood Floor Coatings

Reflections offers both water-based and oil-based wood floor coatings. When a wood floor is first installed, it’s important to keep water away while the floor boards expand, contract and stretch. For the first few years of a wood floor’s life, oil-based wood floor coatings can help fill the grooves of the new wood floor and move with the floor as it settles. Reflections’ Coliseum^® Oil-Based Wood Floor Coatings are easy to apply and meet VOC compliancy in every state. They offer superior gloss, exceptional durability, and are scratch and scuff resistant.

For older wood floors, Reflections’ Arena^® Water-Based Wood Floor Coatings offer the lowest VOCs, allowing for wood floors to be recoated during normal business hours. Unlike oil-based wood floor coatings, Arena Water-Based Wood Floor Coatings allow for light sports play just 48 hours after the last coat is applied and fully cure 1 week after the last coat is applied.

In addition to mild scents, high gloss, and exceptional durability, Arena^® 300 with Microban^® Technology provides facilities with an extra level of protection. Microban protection is built-in to Arena 300 during the manufacturing process, and provides continual 24/7 antimicrobial protection for the life of the coating while it is on your floor. Microban protection continuously fights the growth of microbes, making floors easier to clean and keeping them cleaner, longer.

Training

Our experts can help you become an expert. When you begin using the Reflections Wood Floor Program, you receive hands-on, personalized training from our expert Reflections representatives. We also provide MFMA (Maple Flooring Manufacturers Association) approved web-based and DVD training, to help guide you as you learn about recoating and maintaining your floors in-house.

Reflections is focused on providing a program that offers the best combination of appearance, application, durability, safety, VOC compliancy, and cost on the market. To learn more about wood floor care and Reflections, contact your local Buckeye representative. 

Wood floors are some of the most beautiful floors in your facility. They’re also some of the most expensive floors. The Buckeye Reflections^® Wood Floor Program can help reduce the cost of maintaining your wood floors, enabling you to recoat them in-house, utilizing equipment already available in your facility.

Reflections products can help you achieve cleaner, brighter, longer-lasting floors that can extend your maintenance cycles. Depending on your facility needs, Reflections offers the greenest, lowest VOC water-based wood floor coatings and the latest, state-of-the-art oil-based wood floor coatings. Reflections maintenance products will clean and restore gloss to your floors between coatings without damaging the floor coating.

In addition to providing superior gloss and durability, Reflections also wants to put the health and well-being of students first. Reflections offers Arena^® 300 Microban^® Antimicrobial Wood Floor Coating, a wood floor coating that continuously fights the growth of microbes and bacteria at no additional cost to you. When microbes come in contact with the product surface, Microban protection penetrates the cell wall of the microorganism and disrupts the cell, making the microorganism unable to grow and reproduce.

Top-of-the-line products combined with in-person and online training is key to the success of the Reflections Wood Floor Program. Buckeye’s full line of wood floor care products comes with hands-on, personalized training from a Reflections representative. This hands-on training covers preparation, recoating, and maintaining your wood floors. For additional assistance, the Buckeye Honors Program can help employees review procedures and teach new employees the proper techniques. Honors presents the complete Reflections Program through a series of videos, providing tests for employees and reporting so managers can review progress of employees.

Reflections’ superior products and training programs can save help you save 35% or more on wood floor maintenance. Achieve lasting results and become an expert in wood floor maintenance with the help of Reflections representatives. See how much you can save by contacting your local Buckeye representative for more information.