TERM

PURPOSE

USE

EXAMPLES of AGENTS

NOTES

Cleaning

Removes visible dirt, impurities and pathogens using chemical or physical means.

Cleaning is appropriate when surfaces are visibly dirty.
When a surface is both visibly dirty and contaminated, and requires sanitizing or disinfecting, cleaning is the first step.

Water, detergent, enzymatic products

Cleaning does not remove all pathogens and does not necessarily kill them.  If cleaning tools are used on multiple surfaces before being sanitized, cross-contamination can occur.

Sanitizing

Lowers the number of pathogens on surfaces using chemical or physical means.  Pathogen numbers are lowered to a safe level, which is determined by a given public health standard or set of requirements.

Food-contact surfaces such as commercial deli slicers must be cleaned and sanitized on a regular basis. Other examples are the diaper-changing tables in day care centers and shared toys.

Water, detergent, enzymatic products, also liquid chemicals (e.g., alcohols, glutaraldehyde, formaldehyde, hydrogen peroxide, iodophors, ortho-phthalaldehyde, peracetic acid, phenolics, quaternary ammonium compounds, and sodium hypochlorite bleach solutions), wet pasteurization

Sanitizing works by cleaning and/or disinfecting to lower the risk of spreading infection. Sanitizing is often thought to be synonymous with disinfecting, but there is a subtle difference in that sanitizing lowers pathogen numbers to a particular standard.

Disinfecting

Kills many or all pathogens on surfaces (except bacterial spores) using chemical or physical means.
There are different degrees of disinfection depending on the purpose or use of the item being disinfected.

Low level disinfection is used for example for common items, such as toilets that do not pose significant risk while high level disinfection is used in healthcare for items that enter the body, such as endoscopes.

Liquid chemicals (e.g., alcohols, glutaraldehyde, formaldehyde, hydrogen peroxide, iodophors, ortho-phthalaldehyde, peracetic acid, phenolics, quaternary ammonium compounds, and sodium hypochlorite bleach solutions), wet pasteurization

For soiled surfaces, disinfecting should follow cleaning to ensure the disinfectant is not “used up” in reacting with dirt and other impurities.

Sterilizing

Destroys all forms of microbial life, including bacterial spores, using chemical or physical means.

Surgical instruments must be sterile.

Gamma and x-ray radiation
Ethylene oxide gas, steam under pressure, dry heat, hydrogen peroxide gas plasma, liquid peracetic acid

Sterilizing is preceded by cleaning.
There is no validity to the term “partially sterile.”