Wee
Design of an ergonomic bath cart for institutional or home usage
Information
Author: Eichenbrenner, M.J.J.
Contributor: Langeveld, L.H., Den Breejen, R.
Faculty: Industrial Design Engineering
Department: Design Engineering
Programme: Master of Science Integrated Product Design (Medisign)
Type: Master thesis
Date: 1-7-2011
Keywords: Bath cart | Patient transfer | Ergonomic | Folding | Chair | Flexible | Transfer
Abstract
Despite the lack of attention, the bath cart is one of the most frequently used products in the daily care of disabled or geriatric elderly. It is used for transporting immobile patients to the bathroom and supporting basic hygiene routines. A company that sells these medical devices is the Medsorg GmbH. Founded in 2003, it established itself stepwise as one-stop supplier for care institutions. The next step for the company is to start producing an own product line in Asia.
In this context, the goal of this graduation project was the design of an ergonomic bath cart with improved comfort, reduced physical strain and efficient economy of time for the manual transfer procedure. The analysis of this graduation project consists of insights about prior research on workloads in the nursing profession, a market study, a product benchmark, legislations and requirements. Qualitative interviews of nursing personnel and residents investigate the context of use and the user-product interaction. The synthesis describes the process of the ideation, conceptualisation, embodiment and detailed design phase resulting in a product proposition of the final design.
The developed concept called ‘Wee’ is a flexible ergonomic transfer chair, designed to support the hygiene routine of people with limited mobility. According to the credo: don’t lift but slide, it allows the user to slide the immobile resident comfortably from bed-to-chair in a lateral posture. Additionally, the ingenious folding mechanism of the chair supports the movement of the immobile person from a reclined to a sitting position and vice versa.
No lifting makes the daily routine easier and more comfortable for both the care giver and the resident. The added value of the concept lies in less working steps, less physical strain, less awkward postures, less time consumption, resulting in less labour hours and much lower costs. The validation of the concept with a functional prototype showed that the conducted users are satisfied with the provided product proposal in terms of usability, functionality, efficiency and design. In conclusion, the participants stated that the concept would support the daily care routine and that they would make use of it.
