R Corp. develops and manufactures various healthcare and nursing care solutions. The company had recently been working on improving the functionality of their new electric bed to improve comfort for users. Mr. D of the design and development department, shared his story with us.
"Electric beds are often used by bedridden people. If you stay in the same position for a long time, pressure and dampness will continually affect the skin, causing bedsores. To prevent this, electric beds have the functions to change posture and disperse the body pressure. The pressure-dispersion function can alleviate pressure and friction. However, when pressure is dispersed, the contact surface between the body and the mattress widens. And it can more easily become damp."
To eliminate dampness in their new electric bed, Mr. D's idea was to move air to exhaust the moisture inside the mattress.
"First, we considered using an air compressor for ventilation, but in this case, the air compressor had to be placed beside the bed. As nursing care sites have limited space, installing it on the floor meant it could interfere with the caregivers.
So, we then considered incorporating a fan into the mattress. As the density inside the mattress was high and the air couldn't flow through, we chose a fan with sufficient airflow to reach the entire bed. However, the fan was larger than the height of the mattress and couldn't be installed," recalled Mr. D.
Taking installation space at sites into account, R Corp. focused on developing a mattress that incorporated a fan, but faced a new challenge in selecting an appropriate fan that could provide the necessary performance and fit in the available space.
While gathering information to solve his problem, Mr. D stopped by SANYO DENKI's booth at an exhibition and discussed his problems with a sales representative. Later, the sales representative visited R Corp. and after discussing their issues in detail proposed a blower.
"We had been considering an axial fan. Axial fans are designed to draw in air from one side and discharge it from the opposite. When we selected a fan with enough airflow to reach the entire bed, the size of the fan exceeded the height of the mattress.
However, the San Ace Blower, the sales representative proposed, draws in air from the back and expels it in a direction 90 degrees from that of the intake. With this structure, the blower could be installed in a horizontal state.
They also explained that the blower had high static pressure and was ideal for mattresses with high internal density that made it difficult for air to flow through," said Mr.D.
R Corp. immediately requested samples, and carried out in-house testing of the proposed blower. "The results of the evaluation confirmed that the airflow was distributed throughout the entire mattress as expected, and reduced dampness. This was the best proposal for resolving our dampness problem. We successfully incorporated the blower into the mattress in our new product, which was an essential condition for use in the limited space of a nursing care site," he said.
After that, they officially decided to use the San Ace Blower, and their new product made a significant contribution to the company's revenue. He concluded by saying that he would definitely like to consult SANYO DENKI in the future.
