Hmmm... (Score 1)

Well...I'm an ex-nurse,back in IT for a year now.2 things spring to mind- 1) Compliance. AFAIK, in the UK (and most of the developed world) nurses are actively discouraged (sometimes by pain of dismissal) from lifting manually. Electronic aids, and info on how to use them, are always made available by hospitals for all nurses to use. The problem is, they very often don't have time to run and fetch an electric hoist, and resort to a quick "whoosh" up the bed, unobserved, of course. The resultant cumulative effect of thousands of "whooshes" is a knackered back. So, a costly robotic exo device would suffer the same fate as every other time-consuming device designed to aid lifting- relegated to holding a door open, drying laundry, etc. Nurses just don't have the time to use them these days. 2) Patient comfort. Most patients react well to being lifted in a hoist- most of them look and sound innocuous- but I think from the description of this device it would be liable to cause considerable discomfort for those being lifted by it- discomfort=non-compliance. Back to square 1. In short, there are already proven solutions to the lifting problem, all negated by hospitals desire to turn over some cash,increase margins and therefore cut staff. Nurses are under a lot of pressure to get the job done, and will often resort to short-term measures with long-term effects. Gary