A Review of Disinfecting Wipes for 911 Dispatch Workstations and Consoles

With so many cleaning products available for cleaning your dispatch workstation and consoles, a question we are commonly asked is "what cleaning product(s) will kill the most germs and help to prevent sickness in our 911 Comm Center?"

This can be a rather loaded question and can answer it in a few different ways. Assuming that most, if not all of you, want to clean your shared workstation to prevent against the common cold, flu, and various other bacteria and viruses that can make you sick. I’ll be discussing cleaners that are disinfectants/sanitizers. I find it best to mention the United States Environmental Protection Agency or EPA’s website as a good reference. Here you can find many products that have been evaluated for efficacy to make sure the public health label claims are accurate. (As with all cleaning products, be sure to read the label for proper usage and safety instructions.) I in no way promote these products and the purpose of this blog post was to explore what options are available for use in cleaning a your workstation and the pro’s and con’s of each.

So, with that being said, since time is of the essence and most of you don’t have 5 to 10 minutes, or more, to sanitize and clean your console from one user to the next; I narrowed down the hefty list of cleaning products, to simply - sanitizing/disinfecting wipes. Here are the disinfectant/sanitizer wipes that I found that were practical for use in a 911 dispatch center. And by practical, I mean each one had a quick contact time, which according to the Environmental Protection Agency, the overall contact time is the time it takes the product to disinfect all the microorganisms on the disinfectant's master label. The longest contact time for the products I reviewed was 4 minutes, which is about the same as the average Clorox Disinfecting Wipes most of you are currently using.

In no particular order, here are the four disinfecting/sanitizing wipes I found to be the most practical for use in a 911 dispatch center:

Sani-Cloth® Bleach is a germicidal pre-moistened disposable wipe (a medical grade wipe commonly used in hospitals) that is ideal for disinfecting high risk areas. These wipes have an overall contact time of 4 minutes and can be used in the disinfection of hard, non-porous surfaces and equipment. (i.e. your dispatch console) Sani-Cloth® Bleach is effective against the Norovirus and a total of 50 clinically relevant microorganisms. Sani-Cloth® Bleach disinfectant exceeds the clinical requirements from the US Centers for Disease Control (CDC) and Prevention for disinfection, as well as Society for Healthcare Epidemiology of America (SHEA). You can purchase these wipes through various online providers, a 75 count container starting around $13.99.

Clorox Healthcare® Hydrogen Peroxide Cleaner Disinfectants. This cleaning/disinfecting product claims to be “the fastest non-bleach disinfectant for your facility”. These wipes have no harsh chemical fumes or orders (also available in a spray). It has a contact time of 30 seconds to 1 minute on 37 bacteria and viruses. The product has fast kill time on more than 40 microorganisms, including 13 antibiotic-resistant organisms. It is the only one on my list that is EPA registered for use on soft surfaces, such as curtains, chairs and couches and kills bacteria on those surfaces in 30seconds. Clorox offers a free sample of the product on their website. You can purchase these wipes through various online providers, a 155 count container starting around $24.00.

As you can tell, there are a variety of sanitizing and disinfecting wipes available for use in cleaning your dispatch workstations and consoles. You can choose your cleaning product based on; contact kill time, what types of viruses, germs and bacteria you want to eliminate, smell or even price. But, whatever the case may be, I hope you have found this review helpful and informative.