Cleaning The Thermometer - rubbing alcohol

Growing up, did anyone else ever wonder why their mom insisted on cleaning the glass thermometer with rubbing alcohol BEFORE sticking it in your tush? I can understand doing that for an oral thermometer, but a rectal one? I can understand doing it after removing the rectal one too, but never made any sense cleaning it beforehand. Plus, it made the thermometer feel even colder going in! In our house, cleaning the thermometer with alcohol was part of the pre-temp ritual, along with shaking it down, and dipping it in Vaseline.

Ya mom always cleaned the thermometer with alcohol before using it. And at the doctors the thermometers were kept in the thermometer holders filled with rubbing alcohol

Yup. In hindsight, cleaning after would be preferred.

Hindsight? Pun intended?

My mom did the same.

It's a hygiene practice. Your mom is right in doing what they do.

When I was little the thermometers at my doctors office were in glass jars labeled oral and rectal. I remember watching the nurse pull out the rectal one and running it under water before shaking it. When she was done she would pour some alchohol on a tissue and wipe it off before returning it to the jar. To this day when I smell alchohol I think about those rectal temps at the doctors office.

It was the same in my house. The only reason I can figure out is maybe some type of air-born germs may have gotten on it. I have two older brothers and she did it that way for them also. that thermometer was sterilized before and after each use. Your right it was cold going into our pink rosebud holes. I'm sure she didn't have to shake it down much.

My mom always cleaned the thermometer with alcohol before using it

My Mom also did the same

One thing I remember about childhood temperature taking is that, after I removed the thermometer from my butt and handed it to mother for her to read, she would immediately clean it, especially the tip, with alcohol on a cotton before storing back the thermometer.

This is a habit I use today: be it a glass or electronic thermometer, we wash it with alcohol, especially after rectal use.

How about you?

(In hospital, the thermometers, also for rectal use, were stored in cans from which emanated a pungent smell. I guess they contained some kind of disinfectant, like camphor alcohol. I still remember the nurse trolley at temperature time, and its smell.)

As I recall Lysol was a common immersion chemical...as is/was ethyl alcohol used in wiping off.

Never had an RT, so never had to worry about the tip.

I take mine every morning and clean the thermometer with a piece of wet toilet paper.

Mom use alcohol, and so did the doctor, i still use it my self.

I do remember my mother wiping the thermometer with a cotton ball and alcohol. At the doctors office I remember that thermometers were always in a glass tube with clear liquid and a black top that the thermometer slide into.

Alcohol is satisfying intellectually but does little to kill bacteria. When we draw blood cultures we always use betadyne to prep the skin times twice. Alcohol to prep for routine venous draws just makes it sting which some people like. For rectal thermometers it makes them smell nice but they aren't sterile.

I remember that my mother used rubbing alcohol beforehand and then rinsed the thermometer under the sink to remove any alcohol. She shook the thermometer down after that, then dipped it into the jar of vaseline. At the pediatrician's office, the nurse took it out of the glass holder that had alcohol in it, rinsed it and then lubricated it before insertion.

I use rubbing alcohol to clean my thermometer after I use it.