Evaluation of the effectiveness of disinfection in dog shelter

Abstract

Cleaning and disinfection are among the most important tasks in shelters and an important link in the prevention and battle against infectious diseases. Inadequate cleaning and ineffective disinfection can spread the disease to animals in the surrounding pens or to people during their daily contact and care of the animals. It is important to follow the order of the individual steps performed during hygiene procedures and carry out subsequent control of their efficacy. The aim of this study was to evaluate the effectiveness of disinfection by means of swabs taken from selected surfaces in a dog shelter – Happy dog, located in eastern Slovakia. The surfaces were disinfected with Savo Prim contains active substance sodium hypochlorite and anionic surfactant. For good cleaning effect was added disinfectant in a ratio of 1:5 to hot water at a temperature of 50°C and sprayed under pressure of 50 Bar. The effectiveness of mechanical cleaning followed by disinfection was evaluated by microbiological swabs from watering and food bowls, wall and floor. Swabs were taken before and after mechanical cleaning and disinfection, from 10cm2 areas. The surface area was wiped with a sterile cotton swab, the swab was placed in a sterile tube with 10ml of sterile saline solution and 0.1ml from this mixture was applied to Endo agar and meat peptone agar. Swabbing of the disinfected surfaces showed a significant decrease in TCB (total count of bacteria) and CB (coliform bacteria). However, on the walls and floors were detected small count of TCB and CB after disinfection in comparison with the counts detected before cleaning but the number of indicator bacteria was below the recommended value. Based on these observations, we can evaluate the hygienic program with the disinfection performed in the shelter as sufficient.