Department of Health and Physical Education, The Education University of Hong Kong, Tai Po, Hong Kong, China.
WHO Collaborating Centre for Infectious Disease Epidemiology and Control, The School of Public Health, The University of Hong Kong, Pok Fu Lam, Hong Kong, China.
BMC Public Health. 2024 Aug 12;24(1):2187. doi: 10.1186/s12889-024-19656-7.
Since no specific environmental cleaning instructions and methods have been developed for schools to tackle pandemics, and cleaning methods, this study aims to investigate the feasibility of a new effective school cleaning protocol in reducing the environmental contamination in kindergarten and primary school settings.
This study implemented a cluster randomized controlled trial with three-arms, namely two intervention arms - groups A and B, and one control arm - group C. The first intervention arm included the cleaning staff who would participate in an educational workshop and be equipped with disposable wipes, while the second arm, group B, participated in the educational workshop only. The third arm, group C, received no treatments.
1080 sample points were collected from pre-determined sites in the study within the 6 schools. At the 2-week follow-up post-intervention assessment, all sites were found to be clean for group A that used disposable wipes, while group B, without disposable wipes, were found to have left more sites contaminated. Staphylococcus aureus was found in the sites cleaned by group C.
Based on the findings in this pilot study, a further study at a larger scale focusing on the education program with enhancement and use of the cleaning protocol can be conducted to train cleaning staff for effective environmental cleaning in a school setting.
由于针对学校应对大流行疫情没有制定特定的环境清洁说明和方法，以及清洁方法，本研究旨在调查一项新的有效的学校清洁方案在减少幼儿园和小学环境污染方面的可行性。
本研究采用三臂分组随机对照试验，即两个干预组（A 组和 B 组）和一个对照组（C 组）。第一组干预包括将参加教育研讨会并配备一次性擦拭布的清洁人员，而第二组 B 组仅参加教育研讨会。第三组 C 组不接受任何治疗。
在 6 所学校内的研究预定地点共采集了 1080 个样本点。在干预后 2 周的随访评估中，使用一次性擦拭布的 A 组所有地点均被发现清洁，而没有使用一次性擦拭布的 B 组则发现更多的地点受到污染。在 C 组清洁的地点发现了金黄色葡萄球菌。
基于这项初步研究的结果，可以进行进一步的更大规模研究，重点关注教育计划的增强和清洁方案的使用，以培训清洁人员在学校环境中进行有效的环境清洁。
