Patients at Saint Louise Regional Hospital have been resting
more comfortably in recent days, thanks to $500,000 worth of new
beds and gurneys.
Patients at Saint Louise Regional Hospital have been resting more comfortably in recent days, thanks to $500,000 worth of new beds and gurneys.
Saint Louise Hospital received 120 beds and gurneys from its parent foundation – The Daughters of Charity. The new items replace 13-year-old equipment that used to fill the more than 90-bed and emergency room facility.
“It was time to replace them. These beds are more comfortable for patients and easier for hospital staff to move,” Saint Louise fund-raising Director James Roosevelt said. “It’s the largest grant we ever received.”
The new beds and gurneys have a lighter and more durable frame, making them move more easily and last beyond the 10-year life span of their older counterparts. Mattresses on the beds also have more cushion, meaning patient bedsores should be on the decline.
“When patients are more comfortable they get better more quickly and that makes beds more readily available,” Roosevelt said.
Roosevelt said the old equipment will not get thrown away. Instead, they are being sold back to the manufacturers who can sell the beds to clinics and hospitals in other countries.
Perhaps the most important upgrade of the hospital’s beds and gurneys is their maneuverability, says Chief Nurse and Patient Care Director Lois Owens. The new equipment can put, for instance, a surgery patient in a greater variety of positions more quickly and smoothly.
“The old beds had heavy wheel cranks. These are operated electronically,” Owens said. “You can almost do contortionist maneuvers to get patients into positions for surgeries.”
Saint Louise is no stranger to receiving money from The Daughters of Charity since the foundation is the owner and operator of hospital. But that didn’t make the $500,000 grantan automatic guarantee, Roosevelt said.
“The Daughters run about seven hospitals and 40 (human service) institutions just on the West Coast,” Roosevelt said. “These grants do get competitive.”
“By awarding us this grant, The Daughters (of Charity) acknowledged us as a vital and acute health care facility in the area that is truly moving forward,” Owens said.
