Ultraviolet radiation: Is it an effective method for environmental sterilization?

The Biomedical Engineering Department of Hospital Angeles del Pedregal a third level Hospital in Mexico City, jointly with the Biomedical Engineering Program of Universidad Iberoamericana developed a project that tested the controversial hypothesis of whether Ultraviolet Radiation (UVR) is an effective method for environmental sterilization. The study was conducted in a clean operating room, where environmental culture sampler plates were placed repeatedly over a 6 month period before and after using UVR. The T test showed no significant difference at the 95% level in most of the plates. Besides, the implementation of the system is neither reliable nor effective as it can be noticed in this report. Therefore HAP started a project for the testing of other methods for environmental sterilization, among which the results for ozone have already been obtained.