At Gumbo, we believe work equipment should adjust to the user instead of the user having to adjust to the equipment. Thelong-term health benefits of adjusting work to support neutral postures has been documented by ergonomists for decades. That this level of function should have taken so long to be introduced to the activity of patient charting speaks to the level of need for caring for care staff.

Consider these facts:

1. Adjustability in office furniture

Adjustability of equipment is a given in office environments. Charting is a similar activity, performed in a wide variety of locations, and making up as much as 75% of the activity of night shift staff. We all adjust the height of our chair seats, the height and position of our chair arms, and often the height of our worksurfaces. These adjustments provide a neutral working posture for workers, and just like all of the health improvements in office environments, adjustability in hospitals can lead to similar health improvements of patient care staff.

2. Adjustable-height vs fixed position

Fixed height positions of patient charting cabinets (normally when the open door is about 40” above the floor) is usually a great solution for staff around 5’ 10”. Everyone else has to do some adjusting to do their charting. An adjustable-height patient charting cabinet moves the keyboard height to a more comfortable position for the user in about the same amount of time as it takes to open a patient chart.

3. Make it intuitive, easy to do...

Adjustability is great, as long as patient care staff can tell the cabinet actually adjusts, and as long as doing so is intuitive. The CabAdjust handles are obvious to users, and all that needs to be done is to grab the cabinet and adjust it to a better position for charting. Since it’s so easy to adjust, that means it will actually get adjusted. Your staff will get the benefits of CabAdjust’s adjustability because the whole process is easy to do.

4. Cumulative trauma in charting

Think charting is easy? Think again. Patient care staff spend hours per day on their feet, and they spend hours per day charting. Short-statured staff may have to get up on their toes to reach the keyboard, and will often shrug their shoulders to get their elbows on to the keyboard surface. They will throw their head back to look up to the monitor, and bifocal glasses exacerbate that problem. Who knows what position their wrists will be in when keying and mousing, but probably not at the desired neutral posture. Taller staff will need to reach down to the keyboard position, hunching their backs and arcing their wrists. To view the monitor, they will crane their necks forward. Each of these awkward postures, over the extended periods they are held during charting, create cumulative injuries that can lead to fatigue, soreness, and at times to injury. Cumulative trauma injuries often require long-term healing, and tend to be very expensive.

5. A great range of adjustment

When the CabAdjust is installed at its recommended height, it can be adjusted to include they keyboard height range of 38” to 44” from the floor. This range meets the needs of about 80% of the US population, and makes it easier for the other 20% to adapt to the adjusted keyboard position.

6. A lot of function for about the same price

CabAdjust is a quality product, built to demanding specifications for durability and performance. Yet, CabAdjust costs about the same as similar fixed position cabinets, making it a superb value. It’s a lot of bang (function) for the buck (price). Why settle for a fixed-height cabinet when you can get CabAdjust for about the same price?