Product testing and the equipment you use for safe hygiene care.

When providing hygiene care in the Long-Term Care setting for the limited assist client through the fully dependent, there are several types of equipment to complete these tasks. They include:

• Supine bathing systems
• Sit bathing systems, most with door access
• Supine showering products
• Height-adjustable shower chairs
• Tilt-in-space shower chairs
• Fixed height chairs; usually manufactured out of metal or PVC.

Each of these products, most often, integrates with lifts for Safe Patient Handling purposes. Other features include (but not always): ergonomic design, ease of cleaning, disinfection systems and overall attempt to provide effective cleaning.

However, one thing NOT common to all is proper testing of equipment and proper certifications through the many 3rd party certification/regulation entities. Some of these include: ISO, UL, CSA and ANSI to name a few. For a significant segment of Long-Term Care hygiene equipment in the USA, there is not clear testing criteria for manufactures to follow. As such, the expected lifetimes of equipment are not clear and Long-Term Care facilities have to find out the hard way the life of the equipment. Like this:

In addition, the ‘Quality of Life’ aspect of the Requirements of Participation, makes this an important subject to address.

Many products, particularly those manufactured in Europe (due to mandatory certifications and regulations) have stringent testing standards. 10,000 cycles is a common threshold. The vast majority of hygiene products sold in the USA do not meet these criteria. Here is a video of what testing looks like when adhering to international standards (you will notice weight on the product and a mechanism to achieve the desired number of cycles):

In today’s healthcare environment, Acute and Post-Acute, the assurances and verification of the safety of the equipment is becoming more and more pronounced. It’s important and reassuring to know there are documented safety tests performed on the equipment entering your facility.

All the best,

Len Sears
Director of Sales, Lopital

len@procare-medical.com
Toll Free: 855-528-0421
Direct: 615-457-0727

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