UV-Concepts (Englewood, Colo.) today announced the launch of its UV-C Enclosure (UVE), an automated, no-touch enclosure designed to improve upon the existing standard of manual cleaning and disinfection of large portable medical equipment.

The UVE is one component of a three-pronged solution that includes digital tags and a cloud-based process management system to enable improved tracking and monitoring of portable medical equipment disinfection in the healthcare setting.

Research has shown that high-touch surfaces on equipment, such as wheelchairs, intravenous poles, computer workstations and infusion pumps, are a potential vector for transmission of bacteria and viruses. UV-Concepts developed a novel platform using short-wavelength ultraviolet light (UV-C, 254nm) in an enclosed structure to boost the inactivation of disease-causing microorganisms. Ultraviolet germicidal irradiation (UVGI) has been shown to be an effective method of disinfection in healthcare over the past decade.

“The concern for the cleaning and disinfection of high-touch surfaces in the healthcare environment has grown exponentially due to COVID-19,” said UV-Concepts president Jeremy Starkweather in a news release. “The UVE completely surrounds an item with high-intensity germicidal UV-C light resulting in the fastest and most powerful UV-C disinfection solution available to healthcare providers.”

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) estimated in 2015 that 687,000 patients are diagnosed with a healthcare-associated infection (HAI) each year in the United States, and of those, 72,000 die during their acute-care hospitalization. While progress has been made to reduce, and in some cases eliminate HAIs, the market is constantly seeking new and improved disinfection solutions.

“With use of the UVE, we have been able to process over 5,200 N95 masks, which allows us to get five uses per N95 mask. It has been a lifesaver when no new N95 masks were available,” said John P. Ostdiek, director of transportation for Aramark at Saint Joseph Hospital in Denver, Colo. “We also run all portable medical equipment that can fit in the enclosure for treatment and have physicians request to use the unit for their own equipment.”