Read any hospital design article or walk the floors of any healthcare trade show and you will see these three words: "Easy to Clean." With the growing awareness of the role of the environment in infection control, it's no surprise that furniture and equipment designers are looking to make their products easy to clean. What what does that really mean? Today, we take a look at some ways furniture and related products are designed to be "easy to clean." (We'll look at medical devices and equipment in a future post.)

Patient Safety Week comes under joint leadership for the first time this year. Combining efforts, the founding organization, the National Patient Safety Foundation, and its new partner, the Institute for Healthcare Improvement, will work together to bring their mission of energizing the patient safety agenda nationwide.