How often should I change and wash bedding?

A bed absorbs half a litre of sweat a night from an adult, plus skin cells, body oils and whatever came in on your skin. That is what dust mites live on, and dust mite allergen is the commonest indoor allergy trigger in the UK. The frequency question is really a question about how much of that you want to sleep in.

What you'll need

• Two sets of bedding
• A washing machine
• Pillow and mattress protectors (optional)

Step by step

1. Change sheets and pillowcases weekly.This is the baseline. Seven nights is roughly when the accumulation of oil and skin becomes measurable in comfort as well as hygiene.
2. Change pillowcases more often if skin is a problem.Twice a week, or turn the pillowcase over midweek. It is one of the few cheap changes that genuinely affects facial acne.
3. Increase the frequency in summer.More sweat, more often. Twice a week through a hot spell is reasonable, and it will feel noticeably better.
4. Wash at sixty degrees where the label allows.Sixty kills dust mites; forty does not. Cotton bedding takes it easily. For lower temperatures, an anti-allergy laundry additive does a similar job.
5. Use protectors and wash those too.A pillow protector and a mattress protector take most of the sweat and skin. They need washing monthly, and almost nobody does it.
6. Wash duvets and pillows two or three times a year.They collect far more than people assume. Check the label — most synthetic pillows are machine washable, many feather ones too.
7. Dry pillows and duvets completely.Hours in a dryer with balls, checked for cold damp patches. A pillow put back damp goes mouldy inside where you cannot see it.
8. Replace pillows every two years or so.A pillow that does not spring back when folded in half has lost its support. By then a significant proportion of its weight is not pillow.
9. Air the bed each morning.Throw the covers back for half an hour before making it. Letting the moisture out is more useful for mites than making it look tidy immediately.
10. Own two sets and rotate them.The single change that makes weekly washing actually happen, because the bed can be remade immediately and the old set washed at leisure.

Tips

• Wash new bedding before first use. It removes the finishing chemicals that make it feel stiff and can irritate skin.
• If anyone in the house has a dust mite allergy, sixty degree washes plus a barrier pillow and mattress protector make more difference than any other intervention.
• Duvet covers wash best turned inside out — it stops smaller items being swallowed and washes the face that touches you.

Common mistakes

• Washing the sheets but never the protectors — The protector is doing its job, which means it is holding the sweat and skin the sheet did not. Left unwashed for a year it is dirtier than anything else on the bed.
• Cramming a double duvet into a small machine — It cannot move, so it neither washes nor rinses, and the detergent left in the filling attracts moisture and smells. Use a launderette machine or wash it in sections at a laundry.

If it doesn't work

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