Trash Chute Door8936785
Wow… What a scary website to see. Trash bags caught in the trash chute in such a way that it prevents the chute doors from automatically closing. And make no error about it, the trash chute doors are needed to close and latch, automatically.
Section 19.five.four.three of the 2000 edition of the Life Safety Code requires trash chutes to discharge into trash collection rooms and the trash collection rooms cannot be utilized for any other objective. So, that means you can't store items that are not related to the trash chute in the room, such as floor scrubber machines.
The scene in the image is generally caused by the failure to empty the cart in time, prior to it fills up to the point where the bags of trash prevent the chute doors from closing. In today’s economy, it is not all that uncommon to learn that staff reductions in the Environmental Services (housekeeping) department stop adequate staffing to remove the trash bags. Whilst this may be a legitimate purpose, someone at this hospital forgot the importance of removing the trash on a regular basis. They require to make this a priority.
From a life security point of view, it would be much better to remove the cart and permit the bags to fall onto the floor. This way it would take a lot more bags of trash to pile up before it would obstruct the chute door from closing. I’m not certain what the hospital’s Infection Control expert would say about that, but I would suggest it as an alternative if the ES division can't empty the cart often enough.
If you decide to permit the bags of trash to accumulate on the floor in the trash chute discharge space, I suggest you conduct a danger assessment to analyze the dangers to patient security. This way, you can demonstrate to a surveyor that the dangers were regarded as if the surveyor has a issue with bags o’ trash scattered on the floor.
