ProBed Freedom Bed - Cost vs. Benefits

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• Complications of Immobility
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• Cost vs. Benefits

There are many methods of analyzing the cost effectiveness of the Freedom Bed™.

The direct costs of caring for an otherwise healthy immobilized person are considerable. When that person develops complications of immobility such as pressure ulcers, bladder infections or pneumonia, the costs will rise substantially.

Costs of Bed Sores:

The approximate daily treatment costs for pressure ulcers in US hospitals range from $39 per day for a stage I ulcer to $811 per day for a stage IV ulcer. Stage IV ulcers can take up to 90 days to heal, leading to a total treatment cost of as much as $73,000 per occurrence. Under these circumstances the purchase price of a Freedom Bed™ would be recouped in as little as 30 days. The repayment period is even shorter when the regular hospitalization costs of the patient are factored in. Thus the prevention of bedsores and other complications of immobility such as pneumonia (which can cost up to $40,000 per occurrence to treat) in home-based individuals who would require hospitalization is one key method of considering savings to be realized.

Reducing costs, optimizing staff utilization and providing a high level of care are critical in the home, hospital and the nursing home environments given the extremely high costs of the specific care mentioned above. The purchase of a Freedom Bed™ can also be rationalized on the basis of the bed’s ability to reduce the time associated with the manual turning of immobilized people. An analysis of the daily and annualized costs of using a programmable Freedom Bed™ to turn a bed-fast person (requiring turning every two hours) versus the traditional method of using one or two nurses/support staff in conjunction with a conventional hospital bed, is shown at the bottom of the page.

It is clear from the data that the Freedom Bed™ is cost-effective even when only one institutional employee is used to turn a single patient every two hours, as the daily cost of so doing ($13 US) can be equivalent to the daily lease rate for a Freedom Bed™. This price comparison is drawn before additional benefits such as fewer back injuries, less sick time, reduced workers’ compensation claims and less patient treatment costs are factored into the potential cost savings.

Home Care:

Substantial financial savings will also be enjoyed in home care situations as, in many cases, the use of the Freedom Bed™ means that live-in nighttime caregivers will either not be required, or the hours can be significantly reduced. The cost of nighttime caregivers varies dramatically by geographical area as do the rules pertaining to facilities you need to provide for them. This also varies depending on whether you use an agency or hire independently.

Our experience, backed up by independent cost analysis, shows that, depending on the specific needs of the user, the costs of an 8 hour nighttime turning shift often exceeds $50,000 per year. This means that our top of the line Freedom Bed™ has paid for itself in less than 6 months.

In one example, we had a heavy individual who required two people to turn him at night in a home care setting. The agency charged $20 per hour per person. The occupational therapist calculated that the Freedom Bed™ would pay for itself in less than three months and the bed would save the insurance company $117,000 for every year that this person used the bed.

Recent advances in health-care and state-of-the-art medications mean that people living with varying types of immobility may, in many cases, live a full life span requiring them to be turned every night for decades. The Freedom Bed™ meets the challenges of long-term care as it has been designed specifically to provide many years of trouble-free, safe and comfortable service to the user. It is not hard to deduce from this that the Freedom Bed™ may well save several hundreds of thousands of dollars over its life span.

Nursing Home Environment
Financial Analysis of the Freedom Bed™ vs Standard Hospital Bed
	Freedom Bed™ (Par3-A3F)		Conventional Hospital Bed (One Person Turning)		Conventional Hospital Bed (Two Persons Turning)
	Assumptions	Annual Cost	Assumptions	Annual Cost	Assumptions	Annual Cost
Capital Expenditure (Initial Purchase Price Amortized over 10 years)	$24,500	$2,450	$3,000	$300	$3,000	$300
Maintenance Costs (Annual maintenance costs plus cost of mattress replacement)	5% of purchase price plus mattress costs	$1,725	5% of purchase price plus mattress costs	$650	5% of purchase price plus mattress costs	$650
Labour Costs
Total staff time to turn patient once (minutes)	0		5		10
Total cost to turn patient 12 times daily (Based on $10 per hour + 30% benefits)	$0.00	$0.00	$13.00	$4,745	$26.00	$9,490
Total Annual Variable Cost		$1,725		$5,395		$10,140
Total Annual Cost		$4,175		$5,695		$10,440

Additional Savings by Eliminating Manual Turning of Patients:

Fewer Back Injuries:

• Fewer sick days
• Reduced workers compensation claims
• Reduced cost of hiring replacement staff

Reduced Staff Turnover (National average turnover rate for certified nursing assistants (CNAs) = 49% annually):

• Decreased costs of recruiting, hiring and training
• Reduced cost of overtime and/or contract labour
• Reduced cost of using more expensive staff when CNAs not available

Increased Patient Health:

• Reduced risk of pressure ulcers and bladder and respiratory infections through more consistent turning
• Less intervention - patients are more comfortable and sleep better
• Reduced risk of patient injury