Bringing innovation to the forefront of cleanliness
Our HIF Domestics Team are a key team in the first line of defence for infection prevention. They ensure the wards and departments of Harrogate District Hospital are clean and safe for our patients, visitors and colleagues, as well as ensuring that we maintain the National Cleaning Standards (2025) for NHS establishments.
In order to maintain this, in the light of ever-developing innovations, HIF strives to stay updated with improved procedures, products and prescribed standards.
One of our more recent and exciting improvements has been the introduction of our Robotic Scrubber and Dryer! This state of the art machine, the Meta-Scrub60, has been developed to enhance the way we clean floors across the Hospital site, with the aim of supporting our existing team and improving overall efficiency in cleaning methods.
The robot is equipped with a combination of 12 sensors, enabling it to identify, detect and avoid static and dynamic obstacles in all situations, which in turn allows for the performance of safe cleaning operations. It features dynamic obstacle avoidance, allowing it to detect and avoid both static and moving objects above 5cm high, thereby offering enhanced safety alongside superior cleaning.
This particular model has a zero degree turning radius, allowing for seamless and precise cleaning to less than 10cm from a wall edge. It also features a 50 litre clean water tank and equivalent recovery tank, which allows for effective water recycling and up to 4 hours of scrubbing operations on one charge.
This introduction enhances our sustainability efforts, in line with our Green Plan, as well as allowing our Domestic Colleagues to focus on the more complex areas of cleaning, such as precise edges and high traffic areas. The robot’s capabilities and intelligent navigation allows it to map out areas and then clean them in a methodical and efficient manner, ensuring consistent and high-quality cleaning results, with every use.
Our Domestics Team will deploy this robot during quieter hours, such as overnight, to allow us to keep public areas clean, without disruption.
The Meta-Scrub60 also collates real-time data, allowing us to analyse the effectiveness of its cleaning, together with how much energy is saved through the usage of the robot, all of which will allow us to continue our commitment to innovation and colleague wellbeing, whilst maintaining a clean and safe environment for everyone.
The usage of similar robots is advancing throughout the NHS, with many Trusts naming their robot. We do not, as yet, have a name for our robot and we would welcome any suitable suggestions!
If you would like more information about HIF or the work that we do, please feel free to contact me at [email protected].