Washington, D.C. – Today, Consumer Federation of America (CFA), the National Consumer Voice for Quality Long-Term Care (Consumer Voice), bed rail activist Gloria Black, and 60 other organizations filed a petition with the U.S Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) requesting a ban of adult portable bed rails or mandatory standards if a ban is not accepted. The groups are also asking CPSC to recall dangerous bed rails and refund consumers. For the purpose of the petition, portable bed rails are considered to be those that are sold and marketed directly to the public, and intended to be used with a home-style bed. This would include those marketed on the Internet, in department stores and other retail outlets, directly by manufacturers, and also in medical supply stores.
CPSC has been aware of deaths and injuries involving bed rails since 1985. In an October 11, 2012 report from CPSC, “Adult Portable Bed Rail-Related Deaths, Injuries, and Potential Injuries: January 2003 to September 2012,” CPSC documented that in that nine year period there were an estimated 36,900 visits to hospital emergency wards due to incidents related to both portable and non-portable bed rails. CPSC also reported 155 portable bed rail deaths for that same time period. These statistics represent only a fraction of the actual number of alleged bed rail related deaths. According to CPSC’s 2012 report, these deaths and injuries most commonly occur when the victim is “caught, stuck, wedged, or trapped between the mattress/bed and the bed rail, between bed rail bars, between a commode and rail, between the floor and rail, or between the headboard and rail.”
“For nearly three decades, the public has been led to believe that use of bed rails makes a person ‘safer.’ What the CPSC revealed in their recent study on portable bed rails this past fall was an indisputable fact that tens of thousands of bed rail users, as they were rushed off to emergency departments, had their lives not made safer at all, but, rather, threatened by use of bed rails,” stated Gloria Black. “It is high time that products which can turn so easily into death traps are taken off the market, and that we protect our frail elderly from dangerous products in the same manner as we do for our children.”
“Too many people have been seriously injured or killed while using adult bed rails that are marketed as products to increase the safety of consumers,” stated Rachel Weintraub, Legislative Director and Senior Counsel with Consumer Federation of America. “These asphyxiation and entrapment deaths and injuries have not been adequately prevented by any voluntary efforts by bed rail manufacturers. These incidents could and should have been prevented by strong federal efforts, which is why we are urging the CPSC to take action today.”
“The large number of organizations, both national and state, who have joined in this petition, indicates the deep collective interest of so many organizations seeking CPSC involvement in addressing hazards posed by adult bed rails. Our organizations are united in calling for CPSC to take all necessary action to protect vulnerable adults from death and injury related to these products,” stated Sarah Wells, Consumer Voice Executive Director.