I met the using of "having cleaned" while I didn't meet this kind of using before and I would like to know what is the name of this structure in English grammar, in order to read and to get more information about it.
The full sentence is:
"So if you cannot reduce the patient's shivering for any reason, you can't get rid of any artefact despite having cleaned the skin, optimised your position, patient comfort, made sure your patient is as warm as they can be, but in circumstances it's not always possible to reduce all disturbances to a normal ECG.In that case, you could use to filter button."
Best Answer
Having cleaned may be called a gerund-participial perfect—the gerund or present-participle form of the perfect construction HAVE cleaned. The perfect construction may be conjugated with infinitive and gerund-participle forms of HAVE as well as with the finite forms (have, has, had) with which you are probably more familiar.
Traditional grammar distinguishes between gerund and present participle uses of the -ing form: the term gerund is used when the form acts as a noun and the term present participle is used when it acts as an adjective or as a component of the progressive construction. In your example, having cleaned the skin acts as the object of the preposition despite, so having cleaned is parsed as noun-like and traditional grammar calls this use a gerund perfect or something similar.
This distinction is of dubious value, since a) the adjectival or nominal quality of the -ing form often (perhaps usually) coexists with some degree of verbal quality, b) that adjectival or nominal quality is often ascribable only to the phrase or clause which the -ing form heads, not the -ing form in isolation, and c) there is no evident reason why progressive and uncontroversially clausal uses of the form should be categorized as adjectival participles rather than nominal gerunds.
Consequently, The Cambridge Grammar of the English Language calls the -ing form a ‘gerund-participle’ in all its uses. It’s an awkward name, but it preserves some continuity with traditional terminology without conceding anything to traditional analysis.