An 80-bed long-term care home running standard precaution practice typically plans about 24,000 to 32,000 examination gloves per two weeks, 1,600 to 3,200 procedure masks, and 400 to 900 isolation gowns, depending on how much care is delivered at the bedside and whether the home is in an outbreak. The ranges are wide because the driver is not bed count — it is care interactions per resident per day. A workable method is to count interactions rather than beds. A home that standardises on one 4 mil nitrile examination glove for routine care can use the same cell in the model below for every unit.
Below is the arithmetic, the assumptions behind it, and how to adjust when the home moves into outbreak conditions or adds a unit. The numbers are a planning model, not a purchase order: your infection control lead should confirm the assumptions against your own interaction counts.
What is the two-week PPE calculation for an 80-bed home?
| Item | Assumption | Two-week range |
|---|---|---|
| Examination gloves | 15–20 glove changes per resident per day | 24,000–32,000 |
| Procedure masks | 1–2 per resident per day | 1,600–3,200 |
| Isolation gowns | 0.35–0.8 per resident per day | 400–900 |
| Hand sanitiser | 2–4 mL per resident per day | 2.2–4.5 L |
How do you count care interactions instead of beds?
Pick one unit for three days and record glove dispenser counts against resident-days. A resident-day is one resident for one day. Divide the gloves used by the resident-days observed and you have a real coefficient for your home. Multiply by 80 residents and 14 days for the two-week figure. Homes that do this usually find their coefficient is higher on the dementia and palliative units and lower on the independent-living floors, so the coefficient should be kept per unit, not as one house number.
How much do gloves, masks and gowns change in an outbreak?
Substantially, and unevenly. Glove use rises with the number of contact precautions, mask use rises with the number of respiratory precautions and visitor screening, and gown use rises fastest because gowns are tied to contact precautions rather than to routine care. A home in an enteric outbreak can see gown use double while glove use rises by a third. That is why the buffer stock should be weighted toward gowns and masks, not spread evenly across the three items.
What buffer should a home hold beyond two weeks?
Hold four to six weeks of the items you cannot substitute and two to three weeks of the rest. Masks and gowns are the hard constraint in a supply disruption; gloves have more interchangeable sources because the
Finished goods from several manufacturers meet the same ASTM test methods. Store to the label conditions, rotate stock first in first out, and keep one carton of each size unopened as a reserve on each unit.
Which purchase format suits a care home?
Buy by the case and put the case where the care happens. Gloves leave the store room fastest when a box is within reach at the point of care, so plan one box per resident room cluster rather than a central cupboard. Masks and gowns can stay in a unit-level store. Track the case count on a printable sheet so reordering is driven by consumption rather than by an empty shelf.
Make it repeatable: print the compliance log templates, use the same page as your free log generator, and ask a compliance specialist when a result is unclear.
Ordering for a clinic, lab or care home? Wholesale and multi-site ordering covers case pricing and account setup, and the B2B wholesale collection lists the lines stocked for institutional buyers. Reselling? become a distributor.
Related reading
How many gloves a care home uses per bed per month · Exam glove monthly usage: five-operator clinic audit · Isolation gown sizing in Canada: staff fit
Frequently Asked Questions
How many gloves does an 80-bed care home use in two weeks?
Plan for 24,000 to 32,000 examination gloves using 15 to 20 glove changes per resident per day, then refine with your own dispenser count.
How many gowns should a care home hold?
Budget 400 to 900 gowns per two weeks at 0.35 to 0.8 per resident per day, and hold four to six weeks of buffer because gown use rises fastest in an outbreak.
Should the same coefficient be used across all units?
No. Keep a separate interaction coefficient for dementia and palliative units; they consistently run higher than independent-living floors.
What is the simplest way to plan PPE volume?
Count glove dispenser consumption against resident-days for three days on one unit, then scale to the whole home.
CliniEco Medical is a licensed medical device establishment (MDEL #35334).
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