How Wheelchair Equipment Is Vital To The Medical And Retail Industry
Whether one is transporting a person from a hospital room to an exam room or lab procedure
, through a crowded airport or using a rental wheelchair in a shopping mall, museum or other locale, wheelchair equipment can be just as vital to safe and effective use as the vehicle itself. After all, if the accessories and attendant aspects do not work, the chair itself can rapidly become a very unpleasant prospect.There was a time when someone with mild, moderate, or severe mobility impairment was grateful to have any type of transport at all that allowed leaving the house or even the bed. However, this was before medical science had advanced to a stage where many previously fatal problems take on a character far closer to inconvenience in daily life. Although, if the proper equipment is not present, inconvenient can revert to dire with astonishing rapidity.
Many people who require the use of transport or medical wheelchairs in this present day do not have anything technically wrong with their feet or legs, but rather suffer from a range of breathing or similar issues, which render them unable to walk for long periods of time. Fortunately, that no longer prevents them from carrying out tasks most of us take for granted, like shopping, and that some even consider pleasurable. Like shopping.
However, equipment like stands for holding and securing oxygen tanks become a necessity and any transport system that cannot support such an item is more hazard than help. There also must be a place to hold luggage or purchases and any other bags or equipment the user might require.
Again, the reasons for this are twofold. The first is simple convenience and sense. If a person requires a transport wheelchair to get around over moderate distances, they will probably be unable to carry heavy groceries, shopping bags, or luggage on their laps while doing so. Also, ease of storage and access helps protect the institution that supplies the transport from litigation that might result if the items are transferred separately and lost.
Similar requirements apply in hospitals or other care settings. A good medical transport chair should not only be able to support the patient but come with equipment that allows for the support of IVs and similar items.
This is much safer and efficient than slowly pushing a tube filled with fluid attached to the patient by a needle in the vein alongside. The IV or oxygen tank and tubes are much better protected from accidents, which could cause serious distress - and litigation - if the equipment used to transport them is part of the medical transport chair.
As it turns out, a wheelchair is not just a single item. It has many parts and if it does not come with an array of wheelchair equipment to support its occupants and attendants, it should. Too many do not, relying on setups that have not kept up with the times. However, one company does address all these needs and more.
by: Amy Hart