What would you do?

Here's a tale that seems to be all to familiar to those of us in the rehab industry. It is told by a cab driver who is sent to pick up a 'Lil' Ol' Lady' from the hospital. The poor woman is non-ambulatory and should be sent home in van transportation, but the cab ride was cheaper. This puts the cabbie in an awkward situation:

"Look, lil' ol' lady," I told the Lil' Ol' Lady, "the only way I can get you into this car is to pick you up and put you in it." We were not supposed to do this, because of our insurance. Imagine if I had dropped her and she had ended up not with a bruised hip but a broken one. Worse, imagine if she had croaked.

Have you ever been in a similar situation? When you get to an appointment and realize there is nobody there to help make transfers in and out of a chair or bed, what do you do?

Keep Your Clients Safe in Their Vehicles

Wheelchair transportation safety can be a controversial subject because there is still no mandatory standard for manufacturers or transportation companies. School buses have federally mandated rules regarding seat belts and tie downs but they are interpreted differently from area to area. I worked in one county that had multiple school districts each with their own rules on seatbelt and chest harness requirements for pediatric wheelchairs. Some buses provide secondary shoulder restraint systems and some rely on wheelchair mounted positioning belts.

For the record, positioning belts are not strong enough and not usually tested for use as a vehicle safety restraint but should always be used in conjunction with the vehicle secondary restraints.

Most public transportation systems use a multi-point tie down method of some type but personal vehicles use tie downs as well as single point docking devices like the EzLock or Permolock products.

ANSI/RESNA has created a voluntary industry standard, WC19 Wheelchairs Used as Seats in Motor Vehicles, that establishes minimum design and performance requirements for wheelchairs that remain occupied by their users when traveling in motor vehicles. The main safety features of the standard are:

• 4 Specific attachment points for tiedowns
• Wheelchair must successfully pass 30 mph, 20-g crash test
• Chairs must be tested using a wheelchair anchored pelvic safety belt connected to a vehicle anchored shoulder belt

The WC19 website has a list of wheelchairs that have passed the current standards. It looks like the majority of manufacturers have at least a few products available that have passed the test. Notably, Sunrise Medical currently does not have a product that complies with the new standards. The product list has not been updated since July 2007, so hopefully the next update will include a longer list of compliant products.

Information on the standards are presented in a consumer friendly format with down-loadable brochures at: http://www.travelsafer.org/index.shtml

University of Michigan Transportation Research Institute via Gearability

How will the WC19 product list affect your product recommendations?