Bed Boost Control for Caregiver Injury Reduction
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Solution Overview
Problem
Adjustable beds in healthcare settings often cause occupants to migrate towards the foot of the bed during adjustments, increasing caregiver workload and risk of injury when repositioning.
Innovation Solution
An adjustable bed with a single-action boost control that adjusts elevation, profile, and angular orientation to a pre-defined boost configuration, facilitating the repositioning of occupants towards the head of the bed, including a boost elevation setting, a flat profile, and a head-down angular orientation, which can be dependent or independent of the initial elevation.
Engineering Contradictions & Design Principles
Engineering Contradiction Analysis
1Ease of operation
If conventional bed adjustments are made to change elevation, profile, or angular orientation, then the bed configuration is adjusted to desired settings, but the occupant migrates toward the foot of the bed
Solution Approach 1:
The boost control feature pre-positions the bed in a head-down angled configuration before caregiver arrival, so that when the caregiver enters the room, the occupant is already positioned favorably for efficient transfer or repositioning operations
2Adaptability or versatility
If the bed adjusts elevation, profile, and angular orientation using conventional multi-control systems, then the desired configuration is achieved, but the device complexity increases
Solution Approach 1:
The boost control merges multiple bed adjustment functions (elevation change, profile modification, and angular orientation) into a single integrated control feature, allowing the caregiver to achieve the optimal occupant position with one action rather than coordinating multiple separate controls
3Ease of operation
If caregivers manually reposition migrated occupants, then the occupant is repositioned toward the head of the bed, but the physical demands cause injury risk to the caregiver
Solution Approach 1:
The bed system automatically performs the repositioning function by adjusting its own configuration (elevation, profile, and angular orientation) in response to the boost control input, eliminating the need for the caregiver to physically maneuver the occupant and thereby removing the associated injury risk
Data Source
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AI summary
An adjustable bed (20) comprises an occupant support (66) having adjustable settings that include an elevation, a profile and an angular orientation. The bed (20) also includes an interface (80) for allowing desired values of the adjustable settings to be individually commanded. The bed (20) also includes a single-action boost control (124) for commanding a boost configuration comprising a boost elevation setting and a boost profile setting and a boost angular orientation setting. The bed (20) also includes an adjustment system for adjusting the bed (20) to the desired values of the adjustable settings in response to inputs to the interface and for adjusting the elevation, profile and angular orientation to the boost configuration settings in response to input applied to the single-action boost control (124).