How Do You Store Your Hospital Mattresses?
Over the last few years, hospital mattresses have changed, with varying technologies for pressure reduction, bariatrics, and cleanability. Weight and prices have also changed, with mattresses selling for thousands of dollars and weighing 80 lbs or more. Appropriate storage and handling of hospital mattresses have never been so important for occupational health and safety.
Somewhere in the recesses of every hospital, you will find a stash of spare mattresses. These are necessary to be in inventory due to contamination, damage, or special patient requirements, but in most cases, their storage has not been properly considered. Sometimes, they are stacked on the floor, stashed on warehouse-style racks, stacked on top of an old bed, or just put in a corner.
COST
It is no secret that specialty hospital mattresses can get really expensive! A single mattress can cost over $4,000.00, the same mattresses we see stacked on concrete floors. If you had 10 of these mattresses sitting on the floor, getting damaged prematurely, maintaining and keeping good mattresses in inventory would be very costly. The cost of appropriate storage facilities is a smart investment that many hospitals have not yet considered.
SAFETY
With mattresses weighing as much as 80 lbs each, it signals occupational risk assessments in the lifting and transport from the storage area to the patient rooms. Starting with the storage area, if two or three mattresses fall over, the combined weight is significant and enough to cause injury or damage. Mattresses should be divided into groups so that the total weight is safe for handling and stored in such a way that there is no risk of a domino effect should they start to fall.
Appropriate training should be mandatory when lifting hospital mattresses to avoid back and shoulder strain or injury. The weight is heavy enough, but a mattress can be quite unwieldy if it is not lifted the right way. Some mattresses require a two-person lift. This is especially true when your stash of mattresses is stacked on the floor.
Occasionally, you will see mattresses stored on racking, which is not purpose-built. The mattress rack must be heavy-duty and capable of holding a lot of weight without tipping. You could have close to 1000 lbs on a rack, and if that were to tip on a staff member, it would not be good!
INVEST
The investment in quality mattress racks can seem unimportant and insignificant on the face, but those who have dug a little deeper can see that the investment pays off very quickly by preserving expensive mattresses from damage in handling and, more importantly, improving the safety of the staff.
Spacelogic Sterirack is now available in Canada through Stat Medical Inc.
