How to Choose the Right Assisted Bath for Your Care Home: A Buyer’s Guide
Assisted baths can improve service user outcomes and the work environment for carers and nursing staff, ensuring a calming environment for everyone in the home. At Protec Baths, we provide a range of assisted baths, stretchers, transfer aids, and accessories for different care facilities across the UK.
This buyer’s guide will discuss three important factors when choosing the right assisted bath for your care home.
1. Bathing Functions
Choosing which functions you need can depend on the level of dependency your facility caters to. For example, low to mid-dependence care homes can maintain care and dignity with basic assisted bathing solutions, while high-dependency facilities may need to consider a variety of custom bathing solutions to offer complete professional care.
Consider these functions when choosing an assisted bathing solution:
Adjustable Functions
Assisted baths with Hi-Lo lifting provide safe working environments for care staff. Theses bath can easily be lowered or heightened to the best level required for a safe transfer of the user into the bath. Carers can then increase the height to a comfortable and safe position for the bather.
See our Duporth Hi Lo Only Assisted Bath
Therapy Functions
Some assisted baths have various hydrotherapy features that offer an enhanced bathing experience. At Protec Baths, you can easily customise the ranges we offer with specified treatments. For example, our:
- Hydrotherapy Air Jet Spas use air bubbles to agitate the water. This stimulation helps with muscle relaxation and improves blood circulation, reducing pain and inflammation.
- Chromotherapy LED Lights can be added to create an ambience that encourages mental well-being.
- Bluetooth Sound Systems help to calm patients as they listen to familiar music or audiobooks.
2. The Needs and Dependency of the User
Most care homes only have a few assisted bathrooms that must cater to several residents. Therefore, it’s important to consider the needs and dependencies of all your service users when choosing the best-assisted bath for your facility. The factors below will help you make a choice that will benefit those with the most complex needs.
- Safe Working Load (SWL)—Make sure you choose a bath and seat system that can accommodate your facility’s heaviest person.
- Bath seats—These are helpful for low- to high-dependency users who need assistance sitting comfortably while in the bath (you can take a look at our cradles and supports to familiarise yourself with the type of bath and shower seats available).
- Entrance to the bath—Most bathrooms are compact and provide little room for movement. A good transfer system can curb this issue and provide comfort to the user during bath transfers. It can also make the transfer less strenuous for care staff!
- Bath stretchers—Look for a bath stretcher that can be placed over the assisted bath to aid drying and changing users.
- Comfortable immersion—Consider a bath with a dual plug system to create a deeper immersive experience for bathers who may not be able to independently control their bathing comfort.
- Autofill—According to the Alzheimer Society, 70% of people in care homes have dementia. Features such as autofill and temperature control are extremely useful in this regard because they prevent baths from overflowing or becoming too hot or cold.
See our RADA Sense system with autofill and temperature control PLUS duty flush and thermal disinfection with data logging capabilities included.
3. Compliance and Safety Functions
Installing a compliant assisted bath in your facility is important to help avoid possible risks.
Protec Baths is UKCA & MHRA Registered, and our products are designed for the strenuous regulations of the care home setting.
As a company, we follow the standards set out in ISO9001. We ensure that our baths are easy to clean and accommodate water safety and temperature control features, using WRAS approved products.
Crafted in Britain for accurate lead delivery and dedicated aftersales support, our assisted baths are also elegant and can be accompanied by contemporary features to create attractive bathrooms that remain practical and accommodating to your facility’s level of dependence.
Contact our friendly team for more information or assistance: 01726 438694 / sales@protecbaths.com