EBME Forums Forums Management Equipment Libraries Electrical Safety Testing of BEDS

Hi All

As part of our contract we are required to perform EST to patient beds. We have to test the beds with the patients in them !!

Just wanted to hear other peoples views from a H&S point of view of how a EST to a patient bed should take place.

Do you have a policy ?

... yes; I wouldn't do it.

Other than that, what do your company's lawyers (and insurance brokers) have to say about it?

And lastly, when you say EST ... which specific tests do you mean? Protective earth continuity only?

Hi Geoff

We are performing full EST, earth continuity, Insulation resistance, earth leakage and touch current.

Clearly there is a potential hazard to the patient if you perform these tests while the patient is still residing in it! In the case of the earth leakage test the protective earth will be broken during the test and potentially exposes the patient to a electric shock risk.

I assume you are using IEC 62353, which states:

Clearly you are failing in this duty of care when you test while the patient is still connected to the medical device!

Primum non nocere!

We ask the patients who are able to vacate the bed say for their physio or to move around. This is agreed prior and entered to the patient and ward notes and if needed clinical staff are paid for to manage the time out of the bed. If the patient is bed bound then arrangements upon turning the patient incorporates a bed change to substitute the good from bad. In no way do we compromise patient care,safety or excessive sheer issues.
I can send a policy of extract to support this as needed.
Paul

I'm wondering what the urgency is in this situation; something contractual, perhaps?

But what does the Risk Assessment say?

Do such beds ever fail an EST? And what happens (ie, to the returning patient) if they do?

Why not just wait until the nursing staff let you know when a bed finally becomes free, and then go along and EST (and PM) it?

We have a very small team for a 600+ bed hospital and it is quite had to do with our PM's to complete and approx 350 breakdowns a month.....

Yes, there are only so many hours in a day (working week, whatever).

It sounds like you need to adopt that time-honoured biomeds' approach to the work of tackling tasks in order of priority.

Setting up a Risk-Based PM programme might be a good place to start (regardless of what contracts might "require").

When you assign Risk Levels to the various equipment types you look after, you may well find that carrying out routine electrical safety tests on patient beds comes way down the list (and therefore will probably never get done). I would suggest, "Repair when failed" might be a good maintenance support policy for run-of-the-mill patient beds.

I would reiterate what Geoff has said above, risk management is the way forward.
By the way, are the beds class I or class II??
We have a similar albeit smaller problem within two hospices in a service contract,frequently we part from our central office with a blue light when the beds become vacant :-((

Malcolm.