SARASOTA – As of Wednesday, Sarasota Memorial has about 30 patients in isolation rooms. Have you ever wondered how these rooms are kept germ free? Meet “Tru-D.”
Environmental Services Director at SMH, Greg Rosenberger, says they have three Tru-D’s in house. They use it in operating rooms, throughout the hospital, and now, in isolation rooms.
“It provides that extra layer of disinfection in every patient room and all the area I mentioned,” Greg Rosenberger said.
The Tru-D SmartUVC clinical affairs director, Alice Brewer, says Tru-D is a UVC disinfection device that helps with the cleaning process in hospitals. It’s used after manual cleaning and disinfection is completed.
“It inactivates pathogens, germs, bacteria or viruses; it disrupts their DNA structure or RNA structure in the case of a virus,” Alice Brewer said. “So, it prevents it from being an infectious agent.”
“We follow manual cleaning disinfection with hydrogen peroxide with our Tru-D robot,” Rosenberger said. “Tru-D will cycle through about 30 minutes, and basically render every virus bacteria in the room, harmless.”
Brewer says manual cleaning only gets about 50 percent of surfaces.
“We know that Tru-D then can come in and get anywhere from 95 to 99 percent of surfaces clean,” Brewer said.
When it comes to fighting the coronavirus, Brewer says the device hasn’t been tested yet. She explains:
“Coronavirus is an enveloped virus which makes it very fragile and easy to kill,” Brewer said. “And Tru-D and other UVC devices have been proven effective against other pathogens that are much harder to kill. So, we suspect that it might help eliminate coronavirus from the environment, but we don’t know that for sure yet.”
But, either way, the CDC says disinfecting frequently touched surfaces helps fight against the coronavirus.
SMH implemented Tru-D about six years ago.
“Sarasota Memorial Healthcare prides itself on staying ahead of that technological curveball,” Rosenberger said.
Brewer says there are 610 devices in the nation and 80 in Florida.
Brewer says Tru-D technology is mainly for hospitals and healthcare. She says the best way to protect yourself at home is to disinfect house surfaces and to clean your hands.
