News

Announcement from Stuart Meldrum, Prism Medical UK CEO:

In order to drive profitable growth in the important Care Home/ Long-Term Care (LTC) sector, Prism Group are bringing together all of their care home expertise and accounts under one organisation – Harvest Healthcare.

Harvest will be able to offer an industry-leading product portfolio which will now encompass a comprehensive range of pressure care equipment, profiling beds, patient-handling, and bathing products. The Division will have its own dedicated nationwide team of circa 30 Service Engineers capable of maintaining and repairing the full range of equipment, backed up by product specialists to support and train our customers in all relevant disciplines.

Harvest have successfully grown their Care Home/LTC business over the past few years by offering unrivalled levels or customer service and tailored solutions based on a deep understanding of individual customers’ needs and challenges. The creation of this specialist team will support Harvest in accelerating their ambitious growth plans in this sector.

All current Prism Medical UK (PMUK) LTC customers will be managed within this new division, and therefore several members of staff will transfer from PMUK to join the Harvest team over the next few weeks.

Neil Davis, Managing Director at Harvest Healthcare, commented: “I am delighted to strengthen the Harvest team with colleagues who bring valuable customer relationships and patient handling expertise. We are on an exciting journey and will continue going from strength to strength”.

This transfer will also allow PMUK to focus on growing its core markets in Local Authorities, Homecare and the NHS Care sectors.

In the face of Covid-19 Harvest Healthcare have launched a new and improved fully contact-free active mattress decontamination, disinfection, service and repair facility.
The process is specifically designed to kill Corona virus, as well as provide full removal of any other viruses, fungi, bacteria and soiling, by using industrial ozone machines and certified cleaning fluid.
With safety at the core of the programme design, this service requires no contact. Mattresses can be collected from outside your facility and delivered directly back to your door.
Not only does this service give you peace of mind for infection control, it frees up staff time, ensures compliance, and all with rapid turnaround.
Don’t forget all our other operations are up and running too for wider support.
These are just some of the ways that Harvest Healthcare is supporting customers, users and partners during the current situation.

To find out more about our active mattress disinfection, decontamination and servicing offering, or to discuss a broader disinfection project, please email:
sales@harvesthealthcare.co.uk
For general enquiries call
01709 377 172

Here at Harvest Healthcare we are continuing to take all measures to support our customers, whilst also protecting our customers, staff, other stakeholders and suppliers.

We are working safely and in a sustainable fashion which we can continue with for the long term if necessary. We are managing our supply chain, continuing to meet the demand for our products and supplying to all our customers.  With the exception of our Coronavirus measures, we are running business as usual.

As always, if you have any questions or concerns please contact us directly.

Did you know that there are side rail regulations put in place by the government and checked by the Care Quality Commission (CQC) in order to prevent entrapment? These rail regulations have to be adhered to by all care providers, which can be difficult, especially in homes with a range of bed and mattress types.
What do the Regulations Say?
Side Rail Regulations 60601/2/52 state that the height of the top edge of the side rail must be more than 220mm above the non- compressed mattress.
This means that when a mattress is placed on the bed platform the top of the mattress must be at least 220mm from the top of the side rails, as illustrated in the image below:

The regulations also state that the gap between side rails must be smaller than 120mm. Shown in the image below:

How is Compliance Tested?
The distance between the top of the mattress and the top of the side rail is measured by care providers – see below our handy tool to help – and the gap between the side rails is tested by manufacturers using a Cone Tool.

The Cone Tool is 120mm in diameter at its widest and 60mm at its smallest. The 60mm end of this tool is placed between the side rails at the weakest point and 250N of force is applied. If the 120mm part of the cone does not pass through the side rails, then they pass the compliance test. The Cone Test is shown below.

How Can Harvest Healthcare Help?

• All Harvest Healthcare’s standard beds are side rail compliant.
• All Harvest Healthcare’s mattresses can be placed on any Harvest Healthcare Woburn bed and be compliant.
• We offer easy to assemble rail sections.
• Part of our servicing package includes Bed Inspections where side rails are checked for compliance.
• We offer simple to use bed rail height measurement tools, shown below, so that you can quickly and easily check if you are compliant. If you would like to be sent copies of these testers, please get in touch.

Our aim is to solve your problems to ensure that you can offer excellent care and remain complaint all at a reduced cost.
If you would like more information on how we can help you then please contact us.