Lifting Equiptment? Dos/Donts and Patient Safety

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I am working in a MAJOR hospital, and thankfully, we have ceiling lifts, stedys and sara equiptment available for use. Now my question is, when I am using these lifts, I feel EXTREMELY nervous. Maybe to the point of just using my own body and maneuvering my patients using the automatic bed adjustments. SOMETIMES I have another nurse help me using these, but sometimes I do not, and this really upsets me because if a patient does in fact become injured, how will anyone know that it was not my fault and rather a faulty piece of equipment? I have worked insanely hard to follow every policy and procedure, but these lifts are extremely new to me, and the absolute last thing I would ever want to do is endanger a patient's safety and also myself by risking doing a procedure like that on my own. Has anyone else dealt with this and what are your thoughts? Any feedback would be greatly appreciated.

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Would it be possible to have another person in the room with you while you use the equipment? I work in LTC and it is mandatory that we have 2 people in the room when we are using equipment.

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Would it be possible to have another person in the room with you while you use the equipment? I work in LTC and it is mandatory that we have 2 people in the room when we are using equipment.

Same here.

It shouldn't be different where you are just because they're built into the ceiling.

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Specializes in Critical Care.

At the recommendation of the manufacturer, we actually strongly discourage having 2 staff use the lift. Mishaps are pretty rare with this equipment, but when they do occur having more than one staff member in the room was a contributing factor; staff try to supplement the function of the lift, resulting in improper use and potentially failure. Hoyer lifts are different, but ceiling lifts are designed specifically for one person use.

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I am competent in using the equipment, I just deal with many patients who have dementia on my floor who often are over 80 years old. Most of them blame us for "trying to kill them" on an hourly basis for vitals so I was unsure how the policy for these types of procedures are at other hospitals. This is my first time ever being around lifts and I would feel much more relaxed if I just had an observer in the room for my own security and the patient's safety.

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Specializes in Orthopedic, LTC, STR, Med-Surg, Tele.

I would get a helper, always. Sit-to-stands I got fairly comfortable using by myself but Hoyers and ceiling lifts should always have 2 people assisting the patient.

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Specializes in Critical Care.
I would get a helper, always. Sit-to-stands I got fairly comfortable using by myself but Hoyers and ceiling lifts should always have 2 people assisting the patient.

We never use 2 people with a ceiling lift, I'm curious what the second person does?

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Specializes in Orthopedic, LTC, STR, Med-Surg, Tele.

One person to operate the lift, the other to guide the patient into an optimal position. Also usually we check it together to make sure we hooked it all up right.

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I have seen this done as described, with one person guiding the patient in the lift to adjust their head or neck if needed. Also for a patient who had confusion due to medications she needed her lifting equipment to be padded because she was bruising so easily that a fall would have been very scary for her health. Also, I looked around on Youtube and saw most people using 2 person assist for the operation and observation of this procedure.

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Specializes in Acute Care, Rehab, Palliative.

I would also check with your facility's policy on the use of lifts.Where I work all devices have to be used with two people.If you didn't and someone got hurt you are held liable.If you are uncomfortable using these by yourself then you should always get help.

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Specializes in Critical Care.
One person to operate the lift, the other to guide the patient into an optimal position. Also usually we check it together to make sure we hooked it all up right.

Operating the lift takes one hand and even then it's not required continuously, I'm still not sure what the second person does.

Our lifts, as well as other manufacturers, have been tested and approved for use by one person and specifically state that they are designed to be used by one person. There may be other equipment that might need a person to coordinate when using a lift for some purposes (vent, IABP, etc), but otherwise the second person would seem to be superfluous.

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Specializes in Acute Care, Rehab, Palliative.
Operating the lift takes one hand and even then it's not required continuously, I'm still not sure what the second person does.

Our lifts, as well as other manufacturers, have been tested and approved for use by one person and specifically state that they are designed to be used by one person. There may be other equipment that might need a person to coordinate when using a lift for some purposes (vent, IABP, etc), but otherwise the second person would seem to be superfluous.

Maybe so but where I work the policy is you operate them in pairs.

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