Best Practices for a Successful (Largescale) Equipment Installation

In this post, we share best practices for a successful equipment installation in LTC, whether you have a dozen rooms or hundreds of rooms at a time.

If you work in long-term care, you know that there are many measures that need to be considered when replacing and installing new capital equipment at an actively operating long-term care facility. Large items such as hospital beds are central to residents’ daily lives, so it can be disruptive to care teams and individuals alike if not properly managed.

Best Practices for a Successful Equipment Installation in LTC

Get onsite staff and teams involved as early as possible

Everyone who will be affected by an installation, whether a single room or multiples, is one of the most important things you can do.

This includes engaging with your chosen equipment provider as early as possible and scheduling things well in advance.

It is also key to inform all members of your clinical, care, and maintenance teams about the planned installation. This helps ensure minimal interference with nursing staff and PSWs, as well as the residents themselves.

Make sure you have designated team members assigned in advance who can work with the technicians during the install. Some facilities like to arrange to have extra staff on the day of.

Remember, communication is essential. There is a lot of coming and going in the facility, including with large pieces of equipment, so having open communication at each step will help prevent issues.

Check and adjust resident schedules around equipment installations

Replacing large items central to residents’ daily lives, like their bed, can be a big change and quite disrupting if not managed properly.

It is a good idea to check resident schedules in advance. This will allow for an installation—especially a large one affecting dozens or even hundreds of rooms—can be timed when the resident is not in their room. This includes mealtimes, special pre-planned events, clinical schedules, and other considerations.

Verify other facility services won’t be impacted by the installation

One thing that often gets overlooked is to make sure the delivery and setup of equipment isn’t impacted by other services, such as linens, other deliveries, or meal service.

In advance of installation day, the equipment providers should validate your site to confirm that the loading dock can accommodate the delivery truck and that it is available on the day of.

Make sure that other services impacting the loading dock area are not timed for the same day.

Communicate with technical service team throughout

Before delivery day, you will want to meet with the service technicians and provide them with then necessary facility access information, such as keys, master codes, and any issues that could impact installation and delivery.

Take time to understand proper equipment operation

New equipment can take time to learn and get used to. At SFI Medical, our technicians and delivery team always take care to test the equipment and commission the pieces to as final as possible before installing them in resident rooms.

Once installed, your equipment provider should provide training for maintenance staff and clinical team members, as well as residents, on how to properly operate and maintain the beds.

We never leave without making sure everyone involved is comfortable with the new equipment and they are in pristine working order.

Choose a trusted equipment provider experienced in the nuances of LTC

At SFI Medical, we only work in long-term care settings. This means we understand the needs of your facility and are experienced in working with Directors of Care, environmental services, maintenance staff, PSWs – all to get the job done with minimal disruption.

“Absolute minimal impact on our residents was important to us, so having the peace not entirely disrupted while converting 300 rooms was wonderful to see! The after-hours elevator use, offsite assembly, patience from the crew…everything just came together in the home, while SFI did everything behind the scenes.” – Executive Director of Care, London LTC Facility, on working with SFI Medical Equipment Solutions

SFI Medical is proudly Canadian owned and operated and we serve long-term care facilities nationwide. If you’re ready to get started with preventative maintenance, contact our technical team to book a service call today.