Guides · hospital linen
Planning Hospital Linen for a New Hospital Opening: Initial Stock and Timeline
Linen is easy to leave until late in a hospital opening, and hard to fix in a hurry. Here is how to build the item list, calculate opening stock and work back from your go-live date.
Planning linen for a new hospital starts with three numbers: how many beds and couches of each type you will open with, how many sets each one needs in circulation, and how long your laundry takes to turn linen around. From those you can build an item list, calculate opening stock, and work backwards from the go-live date to decide when samples must be approved and orders placed. The most common mistake is leaving linen until the final weeks, when there is no time left for sampling or for shipping.
This guide sets out a practical approach for new hospitals, day-surgery centres and larger clinics.
Start with a bed and area survey
Linen follows the furniture, so begin with an accurate list of every place a patient lies or sits:
- Inpatient beds by ward, including single rooms and bays
- ICU and high-dependency beds
- Paediatric cots and beds
- Maternity and delivery beds
- Bariatric beds
- Recovery trolleys and day-surgery beds
- Examination couches in outpatient clinics, imaging and physiotherapy
- Dialysis chairs or beds, if relevant
- On-call rooms for staff
For each type, get the mattress dimensions, including depth, from the bed supplier's specification, then check them on delivered beds where possible. Mattress sizes on paper and in reality do not always match.
Build the item list
For each bed or couch type, decide the standard make-up. A typical inpatient bed might use:
| Item | Per bed make-up | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Fitted or flat bottom sheet | 1 | Fitted sheets need the right pocket depth |
| Top sheet | 1 | Some areas use a bed cover instead |
| Draw sheet | 0–1 | Depends on ward practice |
| Pillow cover | 1–2 | Depends on pillows per bed |
| Blanket | 1 | Spare blankets stored per bay |
| Bed cover | 0–1 | Often in private rooms |
| Bath towel | 1 | Changed per patient need |
| Hand towel | 1 | Changed per patient need |
Outpatient couches usually need couch sheets or covers, pillow covers and towels instead. Agree each area's make-up with the nursing lead for that area; differences between wards are normal.
Do not forget items outside the bed: patient gowns, privacy-curtain fabric if it is part of your scope, and staff uniforms. The patient gown side is covered in our post on patient gowns for a new hospital opening, and the uniform side in our new clinic uniform checklist.
Calculate opening stock
Linen in a working hospital is never all in one place. At any time some is on the beds, some in the ward stores, some in transit and some at the laundry. Par level is the number of sets per bed needed to keep that cycle running without shortages.
Your par level depends mainly on:
- How often items are changed. Daily, per patient, or as needed.
- Laundry turnaround. The time from dirty linen leaving the ward to clean linen returning, including weekends and holidays.
- Losses and rejects. Items that go missing or are taken out of service.
- A safety margin. For busy periods, laundry breakdowns and late deliveries.
A simple worked example, purely to show the method: if a ward of 30 beds changes bottom sheets daily, and you decide on a par of four sets per bed, you need 120 bottom sheets in circulation for that ward. Your own par will depend on your laundry and practice. Our post on hospital linen par levels explains how to set it properly.
For a new hospital, add a little more to the first order than the calculated par, because usage patterns are unknown at the start, losses are often higher in the first months, and commissioning activities use linen too.
Work backwards from the go-live date
Linen for a new hospital is a chain of steps, each depending on the last. Set dates for each, working back from opening:
- Go-live: linen on beds and in stores.
- Receipt and distribution: time to check deliveries, count, mark if needed and distribute to ward stores.
- Delivery: confirmed in the supplier's quotation, including production and shipping.
- Bulk order placed: after sample approval.
- Sample approval: allow time for a wash test through the laundry you will actually use. See our post on sample approval in this series for the process.
- Samples requested: after the item list and sizes are fixed.
- Bed survey and item list: as soon as bed models are confirmed.
Ask each supplier to state its total lead time in the quotation, and build in a buffer. If the hospital opens in phases, align linen deliveries with each phase rather than receiving everything at once and storing it for months.
Laundry arrangements
Your laundry decision affects every other linen choice, so make it early.
- Outsourced laundry: agree the contract, collection times and turnaround before you finalise par levels. Ask what wash processes it uses, so your linen suits them.
- In-house laundry: confirm equipment, capacity and staffing are ready before opening, and run test loads with the new linen.
- Linen marking: decide how linen will be identified so it comes back from the laundry, especially if the contractor also serves other hospitals.
Commissioning and training
New hospitals usually run mock patient days and training sessions before opening. These use linen and are a good chance to test:
- Fit of sheets on every bed type
- Bed make-up standards for each area
- Ward store layout and stock levels
- Collection of used linen and return of clean linen
- How staff identify ward-coloured or labelled items
Problems found in commissioning are much easier to fix than problems on day one with patients.
Storage and distribution before opening
Opening stock has to live somewhere between delivery and go-live. Plan for it:
- A clean, dry, secure store large enough for the full first delivery, following your infection-control policy
- A receiving routine: count each item against the packing list and check a selection against the approved sample
- Ward stores set up with shelving labelled by item, so stock levels are easy to see
- A named person responsible for issuing linen to wards during commissioning
Linen that arrives early and sits in corridors or plant rooms is easily damaged, soiled or lost before a single patient arrives.
A short checklist
- Bed and couch survey complete, with mattress dimensions
- Bed make-up agreed for each area
- Item list with sizes, fabrics, colours and marking
- Par levels set with laundry turnaround in mind
- Opening stock includes commissioning and early-loss allowance
- Laundry arrangement confirmed early
- Timeline worked back from go-live, with lead times from quotations
- Samples wash-tested and approved before bulk
- Deliveries phased with the opening plan
- Storage and distribution ready to receive linen
Ordering for a new facility
MISHAREN makes flat and fitted sheets, draw sheets, pillow covers, bed covers, blankets and towels in cotton and poly-cotton, cut to your bed and mattress sizes with your name, logo or ward labels, at its own production unit in Konni, Kerala. Each order is shipped to the UAE and delivered across all seven emirates, and the full lead time is confirmed in the quotation so you can plan it into your opening timeline.
Send your bed survey and item list through the hospital linen page or contact us early in your planning.