Reduce staff workload while ensuring safety   24/7 monitoring in all areas within a care home facility   Ability to monitor multiple care homes

Measuring and monitoring of temperature is paramount in all areas of a care home. From food storage and climate monitoring to infection control and regular checking of water temperature.

Fighting Infection

The HSA (Health Saving Association) in the UK classifies elderly people as a high-risk group. Legislation has changed recently, so even the smaller care homes need to keep constant safety checks and ensure there is an adequate risk assessment in place including temperature control.

Climate change is already affecting the spread of infectious diseases throughout the world, as an example in human health, there is a direct risk from water pathogens which can lead to dengue fever, malaria, cholera and, increasingly in the UK, Legionnaires disease. All are linked to warmer temperatures. Within a care home environment with potential restrictions of movement for the elderly in a confined area it is imperative that the temperature does not become too warm.

Our Smart temperature sensors can be used for running water and pipe surfaces as well as environment monitoring – a popular choice for caretakers or building engineers who often bear the brunt of testing and the care home paying for a call-out or service check-up.

Food Safety

The health and age of residents obviously makes them more vulnerable to hazards like food-born bacteria which can be prevented by storing and cooking foods at safe temperatures. There is the ‘danger zone’ of food safety, when in storage cold food should not go beyond the temperature of 4.0°C and hot food should never be lower than 60°C.

There is the very important matter of accuracy. For example, the storage temperature of chilled food is especially critical, so food thermometers should have an accuracy of +/- 0.5°C. Our smart temperature sensors are life-time calibrated to even +/- 0.2°C. Not only are the sensors more accurate they are also automated, compared to manually recorded thermometer readings, which could lead to human error and would have to be calibrated on a regular basis.

Record Keeping

Another factor to take into consideration is what to do with a temperature once it has been taken. In recent years, European legislation has demanded regular food temperature recording. Taking accurate temperatures alone is not enough - Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Point (HACCP) food safety regulations require enhanced due diligence on the recording of results at every stage.

In legionella testing, the sheer number of water points and outlets even in an average-sized building is only matched by the volume of records required to monitor them. All this can be a logistical nightmare for managers resulting in trolling through mountains of paper, which is why many are turning to paperless systems that have the added bonus of reducing the risk of human error.