Each year, more than 2.5 million people suffer from pressure ulcers, aka bedsores. For every 1 person who gets a pressure ulcer, there are at least 20 people who are at high risk of developing one. Its a big problem and devastating for everyone, both in terms of human suffering and cost. In the US alone, pressure injuries can be seen in approx 5% to 30% of the in-patient population, and about 60,000 people will die each year from the complications associated with pressure ulcers.
The trick is to get the pressure off. Nurses are taught to turn a person 30 degrees to the side and float the heels at all times to remove pressure to the very vulnerable bony prominence’s. It makes perfect sense in theory, but in reality it is not easy to do.
Its not a problem of turning so much as it is maintaining the turned position. The nurse has use something to SUPPORT the turned position that not only holds the person in that position, but KEEP’s the pressure off the whole time.
There are a plethoria of medical manufactures that make various sizes of triangle shaped blocks of foam wedges and call it a “positioning cushion”. But none of them recognized that this design does not work, either because its slips out of place, it makes the patient uncomfortable, or it doesn’t actually remove the pressure.
Innovation in this category has not evolved for the last 50 years, and so the caregiver is left to use cheap pillows, which don’t work either.
Jewell Nursing Solutions is the first nurse lead company founded to innovate truly EFFECTIVE pressure injury prevention designs and processes. We are not the first to make foam wedges, but we are the first to apply the principals of ergonomics to patient positioning and support for better results, both for the patient and teach the caregiver.
Our support devices are the the only cushions designed to accommodate the physical ergonomic needs of an at risk and bedbound person, so that he or she can be not just pressure free, but actually be comfortable enough to stay in that position for an extended period of time.
