A registered nurse. A dental hygienist. A plastic surgery assistant. Whatever your profession is, you will need several pairs of nursing scrubs. The hard part is to keep them in pristine condition for the next several years without having to purchase a new set every few months or so. But there are ways you can accomplish this impossible feat? It’s all about maintenance!
Here are five tips for keeping your nursing scrubs in great shape:
1. Don’t Wear Scrubs Outside of Work
After an exhausting day at work, you just want to head home, plop on the sofa, and drink a couple of bottles of lemon seltzer. Because you desire to get home as soon as possible, you refrain from taking your scrubs off and transferring to your normal clothing.
This is unwise. You should never wear your scrubs outside of work.
Here are a few things you need to be aware of:
- By wearing your nursing scrubs outside, you’re contaminating many public places.
- The more you wear it at home, the greatest risk of damaging the scrubs.
- You may get in trouble by management if they catch you.
- Nursing scrubs should only be worn for work and nothing else.
By confining your nursing scrubs to the hospital, clinic, or office, your attire can remain in top shape.
2. Clean Your Nursing Scrubs by Themselves
Who wants to do multiple loads of laundry? Answer: nobody.
That said, because you lack the energy to perform several loads of laundry, you throw everything into one machine: your underwear, your jeans, your scrub top, your socks, your shirt, your scrub pants.
Don’t do this. You should wash your nursing scrubs separately from your normal laundry.
3. How to Wash & Dry Scrubs
So, how exactly do you wash and dry your scrubs? Well, it does take a little bit of work.
Here are some washing and drying measures to employ on your next laundry day:
- The first wash cycle should be with cold water and regular detergent.
- The second wash cycle should be with hot water.
- The remaining wash cycles should be in permanent press.
- Each time you dry your nursing scrubs, it should be on the highest temperature setting.
And that is how you wash and dry your work outfit.
4. A Hot Iron is Key to Great Scrubs
Oh, boy! Another laundry chore! You can hardly wait!
All kidding aside, a hot iron is an important part to maintaining your nursing scrubs and to ensure all of the bacteria, germs, and office elements are completely eradicated from your clothing.
Grab that ironing board, ensure your iron is extremely hot, and start pressing down.
5. Comfort is the Most Important Part
One simple trick to keep your nursing scrubs in tip-top shape is to make sure it’s comfortable.
Yes, we all want to look our best and improve our appearance, whether we’re at the hospital or a private clinic. Unfortunately, by attempting to achieve this goal, it will have a negative effect on the nursing scrubs because you’ll always be trying to modify and beautify your attire.
So, what exactly can you do? Just aim for comfort and nothing else.
Everything from the shoes to the pants to the top, comfort is the only thing you should want and need.
Next to your expertise, customer service, and skills, your nursing scrubs are the most important part of your job. You may not believe it, but nursing scrubs are critical to your job because they need to be regularly cleaned, you need to be comfortable for your eight-, 10-, or 12-hour shift, and you need to appear professional at all times.
With the proper care, you can have great-looking scrubs.