Risky Patient Lifting Moves — A Guide for Care Providers

If you are employed in a hospital or care facility, you should sign up for moving and handling practical training.  The training will equip you with essential skills and innovative approaches for proper patient care and quality assurance.

  

It is worth keeping in mind that proper handling and moving patients in a care facility involves a risk of injury. To master the correct procedures and avoid risky ones, sign up for moving and handling practical training offered by professionals. The more you practice what is right, the better will you be at helping patients, improving their quality of life. 

Some commonly used methods of lifting and moving patients are very risky. Before examining the wrong methods of lifting, let's identify when it is wrong to lift a patient. 

Don’t lift a patient:

1. Because they weigh heavier than normal and are unpredictable

2. If it is impractical or unnecessarily difficult for staff to be stable lifting patient.

3. If the move involves an injury risk to the care provider (all lifting moves, even the safest, involve an injury risk for the patient). 

The following lifting moves are especially high risk and you can learn more about them by taking online mandatory training package for care staff. Professional nurses and care should not use them as a rule:

There are many variations of the draglift. All of them are risky, especially to the patient. The common factor between all of them is that the handler or handlers place hands beneath the patient's armpit (axilla).  The handler or handlers then apply an effort to move the patient in a dragging motion. 

Do not attempt the draglift to move a patient from one lying position to another on a bed.  It is also the wrong option for helping a patient to sit up or to stand from a sitting position. The draglift is just as dangerous with the care provider standing behind the patient as when they're standing in front. 

One of the most dangerous formats of the draglift involves two care providers. Each handler places an arm under the armpit of a patient lying prone on a bed. The handlers then heave or jerk the patient from one position to another on the bed. 

The orthodox lift is a two-person lifting move that looks reasonably safe to the casual observer or untrained care provider. The caregivers stand either side of a sitting patient, passing an arm behind the patient's back and another under the knees. The caregivers then clasp both hands at the wrist and lift the patient by the main force. 

If the patient has an adequate motor function in the limbs, he or she can gain support by throwing an arm over each caregiver. Instead of clasping hands, the caregivers make resort to using a standard or improvised sling. Another variation of the orthodox lift has each caregiver supporting a patient's leg instead of clasping hands beneath both legs. 

Another equally dangerous form of the orthodox lift is the two-sling lift that involves two care providers. Instead of hands, the caregivers use a pair of slings: one behind the patient's back and another beneath the thighs. This is a total body lift and each care provider may have to bend one knee for support on the bed.

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