Lingering odors frustrate homeowners and business owners alike. Cigarette smoke, animal waste and mold produce foul, pervasive smells that are difficult to remove. Despite your best efforts, they often survive over-the-counter cleaning agents and air fresheners, and return with the same potency as before. An ineffectual process of spraying and scrubbing ensues, prolonging the issue and circumventing the problem. Why are some odors so intractable? The answer depends on the concentration of a smell’s source and the permeability of whatever it touches. Cat urine, for example, is a highly concentrated chemical solution that soaks a given area with powerful compounds. These molecules sink deep into porous surfaces and fester over time, making them extremely difficult to remove. Left unattended, these urine stains will produce an overwhelming odor that will only go away if the right cleaning chemicals saturate the affected area. A similar situation occurs in the homes of chronic smokers. While not nearly as concentrated as cat urine, cigarette smoke penetrates walls, carpeting and wooden fixtures. As these surfaces absorb the molecules that irritate our noses, a lingering odor develops. These smells are stubborn and persistent.
Sometimes, they’re even dangerous. Mold Remediation, feces and decayed animals produce noxious odors that pollute your home with airborne bacteria. Once inhaled, these germs can cause respiratory problems that require medical treatment. They’re the reason why people who haven’t been trained in biohazard remediation are discouraged from cleaning up unattended deaths and large decomposing animals themselves. Air respirators and other professional equipment are required in these situations to stymie infectious airborne pathogens.
Unfortunately, home appliances and common cleaning solutions are not effective at dealing with lingering odors. Instead of pushing these smells outside, ventilation systems circulate them throughout the home. Your ability to eradicate them depends on where the odors are coming from and the severity of the source. In hoarding situations, unattended trash and waste rot for months and years, creating a cornucopia of complex odors that are nearly impossible to remove. A single pet stain, conversely, can be remedied easily. But if your carpet is continuously soaked with animal waste, or your walls are frequently exposed to cigarette smoke, you may face a more serious challenge. In extreme scenarios, scented candles and reed diffusers will do little to purify the air quality. While fresheners like Febreze neutralize bad smells, they only offer a temporary solution in these situations. Because the odor’s source often lies beneath carpeting, behind vinyl and inside walls, these products only hide the problem. It will resurface once the deodorizer drifts out of the room, leaving you back where you started.
So what are you supposed to do if you’re struggling to remove a lingering odor? You may need to contact a professional odor remediation company to ventilate your home or business. Bio-One offers a simple and effective approach to restore your property’s air quality in a timely manner. After identifying the source of the smell, we use powerful chemicals and special equipment to comprehensively decontaminate the area. Fixtures in the home that sustain the odor—like porous walls, carpeting and flooring—will be removed and disposed of in accordance with state regulations. Please give us a call at 515-776-1044 so we can address your unique situation.
ANIMAL HOARDING
Every year, there are at least 250,000 animals affected by hoarding.
According to the Anxiety and Depression Association of America, animal hoarders imagine the wonderful way in which they will heal, love, and nurture their pets, while overlooking the terrible effects of having too many of them. While it may seem that object hoarders and animal hoarders are similar, the difference lies in the attitude and behaviors of each…object hoarders save for things they may need someday where animal hoarders feel the animals need them and that they are saving the animals.
Animal hoarders clear a small area of their home of animal waste, or find a special container for pet food, but they fail to address that their home, furniture, and lives are destroyed by having too many animals.
WHAT IS THE DEFINITION OF ANIMAL HOARDING?
The following criteria are used to define animal hoarding:
This definition comes from the Hoarding of Animals Research Consortium, an independent group of academic researchers based in Massachusetts. The full definition and more info can be found at vet.tufts.edu/hoarding.
Even though an animal hoarder may appear to love the animals in their care, the situation gets out of control and the home dwelling becomes a bio-hazard. Lack of sanitation endangers the health of the animals and their caretakers.
According to the Animal Legal Defense Fund, over 70% of hoarders are women and the most common animal victims of hoarders are cats, followed by dogs. While animal hoarders can range in age, ethnicity, and gender, they all have in common the inability to understand the seriousness of their situation.
WHAT CAUSES ANIMAL HOARDING AND WHAT HELP IS AVAILABLE?
There are numerous theories about the root cause of animal hoarding. It is still not clearly understood although notes that studies of animal hoarders show the behavior often begins after an illness, disability or death of significant other, or other difficult life event.
As with object hoarders, animal hoarders rarely seek help or treatment unless encouraged by a loved one or until faced with a forced event of animal removal. Even then, they need support in treating this condition. Without treatment, animal hoarders have an almost 100% rate of recidivism rate.
Treatment usually involves coordinating intervention with local or regional animal shelters (like the Animal Rescue League of Iowa) and animal control officials to make it harder for the hoarder to gain more pets. When family and/or friends can be involved in the treatment, it can allow the hoarder to more quickly develop or maintain satisfying relationships, providing opportunities to give and receive the love the animals offered.
Therapists can help family and friends learn how to be helpful vs. confrontational with the hoarder. Also, where research has shown that object hoarders are helped with proper cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT), this could also be helpful with animal hoarders
THE HOARDING CLEANUP
Cleaning out an animal hoarder’s home is overwhelming and even dangerous. It’s best to hire professional help for a hoarding cleanup. Bio-One is compassionate and professional team of hoarding cleanup specialists who want to help people reclaim their homes from this condition.
We will work closely with the homeowner and the family from start to finish. The Bio-One team is committed to making our clients feel safe and comfortable throughout the process.
You trust your loved one’s treatment to the mental professionals, so trust the hoarding cleanup to the experienced professionals as well.
Contact Bio-One today at 515-776-1044 or via email at info@BioOneDesMoines.com for more information about our comprehensive cleanup services and to schedule a no-obligation consultation and cost estimate.
Jean & Joel Akers, Owners
Bio-One Des Moines
www.BioOneDesMoines.com
Cover photo courtesy of ARL Iowa
You might be unintentionally hosting a living space for these critters, and they are not the awesome heroes like Rocket from “Guardians of the Galaxy.” Not only do they bring family and friends, but often also set up communal sites to do their business. Raccoon latrines are a real thing and yes, they are gross!
Far from just a nuisance and source of pungent odor, raccoon latrines pose dangers because raccoons are the primary host of Baylisascaris procyonis, a roundworm that can be harmful to people as well as other animals including dogs. One raccoon roundworm can produce more than 100,000 eggs a day. Infection happens by (unintentionally) ingesting eggs – while this more likely to occur in children or others who are more likely to put contaminated fingers, dirt or other objects in their mouth by mistake, it can happen to anyone.
The signs and symptoms, as outlined by the CDC, usually take 1 to 4 weeks incubation time and can include any of the following:
If you do find a raccoon latrine in your home, business or outbuilding, proper removal, destruction of feces and clean-up of the site will reduce risk for exposure and possible infection. This clean-up requires extreme caution.
Don’t let these masked bandits and their poop ruin your property and put you at risk. We have the proper personal protective equipment and training for this unpleasant job. In addition to site clean-up, we work to remove any odors and porous materials affected by the latrines. Bio-One is ready to help and we’re just a phone call away!
Here's a hint: In Iowa alone, it happens in at least 39 cities and counties.....
National Night Out (NNO) is an awesome annual community-building event takes place the first Tuesday in August across all 50 states, U.S. Territories and military bases world-wide! (Texas and some other select areas celebrate the first Tuesday in October.) NNO promotes police-community partnerships and neighborhood camaraderie, bringing police and neighbors together as we all work to make our neighborhoods safer, more caring places to live.
Neighborhoods host block parties, festivals, parades, cookouts and various other community events with safety demonstrations, seminars, youth events, visits from emergency personnel, exhibits and much, much more! You never know what you might find at an event in your community!
Want to find out where you can join in the festivities? Click on the NNO logo above or go to the NATU website. There is an interactive map where you can select your state and see where the nearest fun is taking place.
Bio-One is proud to support law enforcement both locally and across the country!
Effective July 1, 2019, a new law will allow the Iowa Lottery to pay $100,000 annually to assist the families of fallen peace officers and firefighters with insurance costs.
Read the full story here:
It is unbelievable as to how many elderly live in homes not properly air conditioned. Extreme heat can cause heat strokes, heat rashes, heat cramps, and exhaustion. When the elderly are living in homes without air conditioning during these hot Iowa summer months, they are more susceptible to the dangers of extreme heat.
Decompositions are more prevalent in the summer months. They could be more frequent due to the heat being a part of the cause of death, but the heat is definitely a part of why they are discovered sooner.
With the temperatures being so high lately, once deceased, a decomposing body quickly progresses its' process and more damage can be caused to the property itself. Remediation can include furniture and carpet removal along with subfloor removal. Depending on location of death, a home’s mechanical systems can be affected if fluids enter any floor vents. In order to properly remove bio-hazards/body fluids, we have to demo flooring, walls, cabinets, etc., or else the smell and hazards are still present. Any remaining smells that linger in the air of the residence/area can be removed by using our ozone machine which is a miracle worker.
Thinking about a loved one not being found for a long period of time is disheartening. Check on your friends and family not heard from in a while - especially the elderly. Summer months present so many more dangers than the colder months. We should all be checking on our loved ones more often, and making sure their air conditioners are working properly. Many elderly are too proud to call their family and admit they are living with no cold air either due to lack of money to pay their bill or lack of will to call a HVAC company to come out and fix their unit. Just like Bio-One Des Moines, your loved ones are only a call away!
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