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When it comes to mops, microfiber is an alternative to check out

Hospital Safety Connection, March 24, 2003

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The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) recently issued a best practices paper that looked at the benefits of using microfiber mops instead of traditional cotton mops.

Made of polyester and nylon, microfiber mops hold six times their weight in water, making them more absorbent than cotton mops. The vendors design these mops with the idea that a housekeeper changes the mop head after every room.

This frequent changing of mop heads eliminates the need to wring a mop or switch cleaning solutions after every few rooms; both conditions are a constant part of working with a cotton mop and a potential ergonomic hassle.

On the other hand, changing so many microfiber mop heads also means more laundering and a significant initial cost to purchase them.

The EPA concludes, though, that using microfiber mops reduces the amount of cleaning chemicals used and subsequently poured down the drain, based on information the agency gleaned from trials conducted by University of California Davis Medical Center in Sacramento.

In terms of worker safety, the medical center's program also determined the following benefits:

• Microfiber mops weigh 5 lbs less than traditional mops
• Because housekeepers don't dip used microfiber mop heads back into cleaning solutions, they don't have to heft and dump the 30-lb buckets every few rooms

Further, UC Davis found it could assign housekeepers on light duty to use microfiber mops because they are easy to use.

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