Source: http://www.patentgenius.com/patent/8099809.html
Timestamp: 2018-07-18 10:40:03
Document Index: 453668139

Matched Legal Cases: ['Application No. 2006', 'art 9', 'art 9', 'art 9', 'art 9', 'art 9', 'art 9', 'art 9', 'art 9']

Mattress - Patent # 8099809 - PatentGenius
8099809 Mattress
Application: 12/093,696
Inventors: Tanaka; Makoto (Tokyo, JP)
Nishimura; Akira (Tokyo, JP)
Mori; Yumiko (Tokyo, JP)
U.S. Class: 5/628; 224/158; 5/625; 5/626; 5/81.1T
Field Of Search: 5/81.1R; 5/81.1HS; 5/81.1T; 5/628; 5/625; 5/420; 5/626; 5/694; 128/869; 128/870; 128/873; 128/874; 128/875; 224/18; 224/158
International Class: A47B 1/00; A61G 1/00; A61G 7/00; A61G 5/00
Foreign Patent Documents: 62-108958; 6-21466; 2003-135221; 2004-358005
1. A mattress for ordinary and emergency use by a user, comprising: padding having at least two longitudinal edges, each having a length, and a width; a coveringmaterial enclosing the padding and having at least two long edges and a plurality of corners; grip portions attached along the long edges proximate to at least one of the corners; a plurality of fastening belts attached at a fixed end to the longedges, a portion of the plurality of fastening belts are attached on opposing long edges; fastening members attached to the plurality of fastening belts opposite the fixed end; and at least one longitudinal pocket enclosing an entirety of at least oneof the plurality of the fastening belts and fastening members; wherein the longitudinal pocket is formed on an outside of the covering material along at least one of the two long edges and the at least one of the plurality of belts is stored between thecovering material and the longitudinal pocket; wherein during ordinary use, the padding is laid flat and extended to approximately a full length of the two longitudinal edges, and the longitudinal pocket encloses the portion of the plurality of thefastening belts and fastening members; and wherein during emergency use, the fastening belts and fastening members are removed from the longitudinal pocket, the padding is bent along a line in the longitudinal direction to bring the longitudinal edgescloser to each other and at least one pair of fastening belts removably secure to each other to maintain the padding in the bent condition.
3. The mattress for ordinary and emergency use, according to claim 1, wherein an opposing pair of the fastening members comprise a buckle consisting of a male part and a female part to achieve fastening by resilient engagement between theengagement pieces of the male and female parts, wherein the male part is attached to one of the fastening belts fixed to one of the long edges while the female part is attached to another of the fastening belts fixed to another long edge.
This is a U.S. national phase application under 35 U.S.C. .sctn.371 of International Patent Application No. PCT/JP2006/316413, filed Aug. 22, 2006, and claims the benefit of Japanese Application No. 2006-051623, filed Feb. 28, 2006, both ofwhich are incorporated by reference herein. The International Application was published in Japanese on Sep. 7, 2007 as International Publication No. WO 2007/099657 A1 under PCT Article 21(2).
In cases where disasters such as fires and earthquakes occur in hospitals, other medical facilities, elderly health-care facilities, etc., stretchers are often used to manually carry people who cannot take refuge by themselves such as patientsunable to walk and bedridden patients, to safe places for evacuation. In such cases, if elevators stop, those people must be carried through stairways.
These evacuation activities include the work of transferring each patient from the bed to a stretcher and the work of carrying the patient placed on the stretcher to a safe place. In general, 2 to 4 persons are necessary for carrying onepatient by means of a stretcher to a safe place.
For the purpose of quickly performing such evacuation work with less manpower, for example, Patent Document 1 proposes a stretcher comprising a cushiony mattress. The stretcher of Patent Document 1 comprises a cushiony bendable mattress havingcylindrical holding portions along the longitudinal edges of the mattress on both sides, with a shoulder belt inserted through each of the cylindrical holding portions; the shoulder belts extending from the respective ends of the cylindrical holdingportions provided along both the longitudinal edges of the mattress are connected with each other to form loops at both the ends in the longitudinal direction; multiple fastening belts with their ends on one side fixed to both the longitudinal edges aredisposed to oppose each other and lie in the transverse direction of the mattress, with intervals kept between them in the longitudinal direction of the mattress; and buckles are fixed as fastening members to the ends on the other side of the fasteningbelts opposing each other.
According to JP6-21466Y, the stretcher with the above constitution can be compactly stowed and can be used to efficiently and easily carry a person, and further since it is cushiony, even if the stretcher with a patient on it is carried andplaced on the ground, etc. to wait for any further action, the patient can remain comfortable on the stretcher.
The abovementioned stretcher of Patent Document 1 uses a mattress, but it is not supposed at all that when the stretcher is not used as a stretcher, the stretcher is used as a mattress on which a person can lie. That is, since it "can becompactly stowed," it is destined to be stored in any place while it is not used as a stretcher.
If this stretcher is used as an ordinary mattress while it is not used as a stretcher, the shoulder belts and fastening belts exposed outside the mattress may disturb the patient, elderly person or the like using the mattress when he/she leavesfrom the bed, since he/she may be caught by the belts and fall down. Further, in the case where the bed is an electric bed, when the bed bottom is raised, lowered or tilted, the belts may be caught in a mechanical member, to prevent the bed movement orto damage the mattress inconveniently. After all, the stretcher cannot be used as an ordinary mattress. The present invention has been created in view of the above situation. The object of this invention is to provide a mattress that can be used as astretcher when a disaster occurs and can also be used as an ordinary mattress when it is not used as a stretcher.
To solve the abovementioned problem, this invention proposes a mattress formed by covering a padding with a covering material, characterized in that the covering material has grip portions fixed to the longitudinal edges near the corners of themattress, that the respective ends on one side of multiple fastening belts are fixed to both the longitudinal edges, that stowing portions for stowing the fastening belts are provided, and that fastening members are fixed at the ends on the other side ofthe fastening belts.
Further, this invention proposes the abovementioned constitution, wherein each pair of the fastening members is a buckle consisting of a male part and a female part to achieve fastening by resilient engagement between the engagement pieces ofthe male and female parts, and the male part is attached to each of the fastening belts fixed to one of the longitudinal edges while the female part is attached to each of the fastening belts fixed to the other longitudinal edge.
In the mattress of this invention, multiple fastening belts are fixed to both the longitudinal edges, but since these fastening belts are folded and stowed in the stowing portions without being exposed outside the mattress, they neither disturbthe user nor is obtrusive in appearance. On the other hand, each of the grip portions provided at the longitudinal edges near the corners is, for example, a looped belt or the like, the grip portions are not so dimensionally long and do not disturb theuser like the handles provided along the longitudinal edges of an ordinary mattress.
Therefore, even if the mattress of this invention is used as an ordinary mattress, it does not happen that the patient, elderly person or the like using the mattress is caught by the fastening belts, to fall down, when he/she leaves from themattress. Further, even if the bed is an electric bed, it does not happen that when the bed bottom is raised, lowered or tilted, the fastening belts are caught by a mechanical member, to prevent the bed movement or to damage the mattress inconveniently.
In the case where a disaster such as a fire or earthquake occurs while the mattress is used as an ordinary mattress, the stowing portions are opened to take out the fastening belts, and the respective pairs of fastening belts opposing each otherin the transverse direction of the mattress are connected with each other using the fastening members, to stably secure the patient or the like on the mattress.
In the above, if the padding is bendable, the above tight fastening operation can bend the mattress, to bring both the longitudinal edges closer to each other, thus deforming the mattress in U shape. In this case, since the U-shaped mattressembraces the patient or the like in cooperation with the multiple pairs of fastening belts, the patient can be safely and stably secured.
In the case where sufficient manpower is available, the mattress can of course be moved by multiple persons, but if the manpower is insufficient, one nurse or the like can hold appropriate grip portions, for examples, the grip portions near thehead of the patient or the like stably secured on the mattress, to drag and move the mattress.
The mattress of this invention used as described above contains the padding necessary for use as an ordinary mattress. Therefore, even if there is an obstacle such as a level difference when the mattress is dragged and moved, the impact by theobstacle can be absorbed by the padding without displeasing the patient or the like stably secured on the mattress.
In these drawings, symbol 1 denotes the appearance of a mattress. The mattress 1 is formed by covering a padding 2 with a covering material 3 like a conventional mattress. The padding 2 can be any appropriate padding used in an ordinarymattress, but it is desirable to use a bendable padding 2 in this invention.
Further, the ends on one side of multiple (two each in this example) fastening belts 6a and 6b are fixed to the covering material 3 at both the longitudinal edges of the mattress 1, with an interval kept between them in the longitudinaldirection, and openable and closable stowing portions (also referred to as one or more longitudinal pockets) 7a and 7b for stowing respectively two fastening belts 6a or 6b are provided. Meanwhile, in the drawings, the parts of one of the longitudinaledges are indicated by subscript a, and the parts of the other longitudinal edge are indicated by subscript b.
In this embodiment, each of the stowing portions (i.e. longitudinal pockets) 7 can be opened and closed using a slide fastener, but instead of the slide fastener, a plane fastener such as a loop-hook fastener or snaps can also be used foropening and closing each stowing portion.
Meanwhile, contrary to the abovementioned embodiment wherein the stowing portions 7a and 7b can be opened and closed, in another embodiment, the openings of the stowing portions 7a and 7b can be closed by sewing in a relatively easy and simplemanner, so that the sewn openings can be ripped to take out the fastening belts 6a and 6b and so that once the sewn openings of the stowing portions are ripped, they cannot be closed immediately.
Further, fastening members 9a and 9b are fixed at the ends on the other side of the respective fastening belts 6a and 6b, so that the respective fastening belts 6a and 6b provided as pairs in opposite to each other in the transverse direction ofthe mattress 1 can be connected with each other by the fastening members 9a and 9b. In this embodiment, either the fastening belts 6a or 6b (the fastening belt 6a in this case) can be adjusted in the length up to the fastening member") 9a.
In this embodiment, a pair consisting of a fastening member 9a and a fastening member 9b is a buckle consisting of a male part 9a and a female part 9b to achieve fastening by the resilient engagement between the engagement pieces of the male andfemale parts. On the male part 9a side, the fastening belt 6a can be adjusted in length as described above. Since the constitution of the buckle and the length adjustment are obvious, their further explanation is not made here.
Meanwhile, the length of the fastening belt 6a on the male part 9a side can be set at an appropriate length beforehand. So, the male part 9a can also be fixed at the other end of the fastening belt 6a with a predetermined length like the femalepart 9b, so that the length cannot be adjusted. That is, on the side of either the male part 9a or the female part 9b, the fastening belt 6a or 6b can be adjusted in length, or it is possible that neither the fastening belt 6a nor the fastening belt 6bcan be adjusted in length.
In the abovementioned constitution of this embodiment, the mattress 1 has multiple (two each in this case) fastening belts 6a and 6b fixed to both the longitudinal edges. These fastening belts 6a and 6b are folded and stowed in the respectivestowing portions 7a and 7b, the openings of which are closed by fasteners 8, so that the fastening belts can be hidden inside without being exposed to outside the mattress 1 as shown in FIGS. 1 and 2. Thus, the fastening belts do not disturb the userand are not obtrusive in appearance. On the other hand, since the grip portions 4 attached to the longitudinal edges near the corners are not required to be dimensionally long as shown in FIG. 1, the grip portions are not disturbing the user like thehandles 11 attached to the longitudinal edges of an ordinary mattress.
Therefore, even if the mattress 1 of this invention is used as an ordinary mattress, it does not happen that the patient, elderly person or the like using the mattress is caught by belts, to fall down, when he/she leaves from the bed, and evenif the bed is an electric bed, it does not happen that when the bed bottom is raised, lowered or tilted, the fastening belts are caught by a mechanical member, to prevent the bed movement or to damage the mattress inconveniently.
In the case where a disaster such as a fire or earthquake occurs while the mattress 1 is used as an ordinary mattress, the stowing portions 7a and 7b are opened to take out the fastening belts 6a and 6b, and as shown in FIG. 5, the fasteningbelts 6a and 6b in opposite to each other in the transverse direction of the mattress are connected with each other as pairs using the fastening members 9a and 9b. Then, the fastening belts 6a on one side are pulled to achieve tight fastening.
In this case, if the padding used is bendable, the above tight fastening operation can bend the mattress, to bring both the longitudinal edges of the mattress 1 closer to each other by the fastening belts 6a and 6b as shown in FIG. 9, thusdeforming the mattress 1 in U shape. In this case, since the U-shaped mattress 1 embraces the patient or the like 12 in cooperation of the multiple (two in this case) pairs of fastening belts 6a and 6b, the patient or the like can be safely and stablysecured.
If there is sufficient manpower, the mattress 1 can be carried by multiple persons, but if the manpower is insufficient, one nurse or the like 13 can hold appropriate grip portions of the mattress, for example in the case shown in FIG. 10, thegrip portions 4 on the head side of the patient or the like 12 stably secured on the mattress 1, to drag and move the mattress 1.
In this case, the mattress 1 of this invention contains the padding 2 necessary for use in an ordinary mattress. Therefore, even if there is an obstacle such as a level difference when the mattress is dragged and moved, the impact can beabsorbed by the padding without displeasing the patient or the like stably secured on the mattress.
Since this invention is as described above, the mattress used as an ordinary mattress by a person unable to take refuge by himself/herself such as a patient unable to walk or bedridden patient can be safely carried as a stretcher with thepatient on it to a safe place for evacuation when a disaster occurs.
Further, in this invention, even one nurse or the like can use the mattress safely as a stretcher when a disaster occurs, and the padding cushiony as in an ordinary mattress absorbs and eases the impact caused when the mattress is dragged andmoved, without displeasing the patient or the like.
Sheet dispenser with braking means