bed alarms

Specialties Geriatric

Published

could anyone tell me if you have been involved with any aspect of bed alarm usage...from their use to researchon their use. Thank you

Specializes in LTC, med-surg, critial care.
We use them as well. The only drawback is those DARN pts who unclip it from their gown to go to the BR...and tell you..."But, I was going to put it back on when I got back to bed!"

I hate when they do that. Scares the heck outta me!

I like the personal alarms they go from bed to wheelchair easily, are easy to hear and are easy to turn off (put the magnet back) when you get to the resident. The trick is getting there in time. I had one resident who didn't want to go to bed so he sat by the nurses station eating ice cream. I went down to the linen room to load my cart when I heard the alarm go off. There was my patient wobbling down the hall and I was running down the hall to catch him before he fell.

I have a love/hate relationship with low beds. My facility uses low beds that have concave matresses making it hard to roll out of bed and even if they do they aren't going far. What I hate is the risk for back injuries when CNA's get a resident out of bed or when they log roll to change the geri-pad. The beds we have don't roll up.

We mostly have tabs alarms and sensor alarms for our res. i love the sensor alarms.. they are great for the res who is slick enuff to unpin the tabs alarm.. they have prevented MANY falls.. just remember to check the batteries.. lol i got a big surprise when i found a res standing over the bathroom sink eating efferdent tablets and her sensor alarm not going off cuz of a dead battery.. i wish they had some kind of beep to warn u the battery is low.. kinda like a smoke detector

Specializes in Trauma acute surgery, surgical ICU, PACU.
Our facilty uses the Tab alarms, exclusively. They clip onto the resident's clothing and with the string attached to the clip a small piece of metal is magnetically in place in the Tab monitor, if the patient gets up or moves further than the string length , the metal/magnet connection is broken and the alarm sounds...seems to be quite effective, easy to use as well.

I remember a nursing home that used that system - one resident simply took off her shirt and left the building! :rotfl:

Specializes in Trauma acute surgery, surgical ICU, PACU.

I work in a hospital, and we use bed alarms. For SOME pts, they reduce falls drastically. For the pt's that move fast, the alarm simply lets you know when the pt is on the floor, even on the 1 second setting, because it's hard for staff to get there that fast.

We have bed rail alarms for our confused patients. There are three levels, movement in the bed, getting out of bed, and leaning on the rail...They're very effective in calling us and have prevented many falls. The rails have to be up though (all 4) so you have to have an order for the alarm.

Keely

While making my rounds the other night, I found our only bed alarm resident sitting at the foot of his low-bed ready to stand up and no alarm going off. :eek: Come to find out it wasn't plugged in. wugh :stone Do you believe that? :banghead:

Our bed alarms work great when there are staff to answer them!!!!!!!!!!!!

Isn't that the ENTIRE nursing problem?!!!!?!?!?!? NOT ENOUGH STAFF?!?!?!?!?!?!?

Wouldn't it just be awesome, if we had like 3 patients to 1 nurse and an assistant????

The patients wouldn't complain anymore about not getting care, they would prob complain we were at the bedside too much!

Wondering what world I am thinking in......... :rolleyes:

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