Current Status and Issues in the Hygienic Management of Toys for Infants at Nurseries

Abstract

The risk of contact infection in infants attending nurseries is high, thus the hygienic management of shared toys is important. To elucidate the current status and issues in the hygienic management of toys in nurseries, we conducted a questionnaire survey on the methods of hygienic management of toys at two nurseries and measured the level of contamination on toys (wood, cloth, soft plastic, hard plastic, and paper) before and after normal cleaning (wiping with water/washing with water/machine washing) at the nursery. The level of contamination was measured as the relative light unit (RLU) of the amount of adenosine triphosphate (ATP) +adenosine monophosphate (AMP). The results showed that the median ATP value was 8,454 RLU before cleaning (5 materials, 385 toys) and 559 RLU after cleaning (4 materials except for the paper toy which was not washed, 315 toys), which is considerably lower after cleaning (p<0.001). The decrease rate in ATP from "before" to "after cleaning" was 93.7% (4 materials, 315 toys). With wood and soft plastic toys, the decrease rate was higher for washing with water than wiping with water (wood: p<0.001, soft plastic: p=0.022). For cloth toys, the decrease rate was higher for machine washing than for washing with water (p=0.008). The ATP level on wood toys was high after wiping with water, which suggested the need for more effective management including washing with water.