Crutches

[snowman]

I have been on crutches for the last few weeks following a bike accident. I have now fully recovered and do not need the crutches anymore. I am not quite sure what to do with them? Do I need to return them to the hospital where I got them from? or can I hand them in into a local pharmacy?

Does anybody know?

[Seabag]

Recycle them, the hospital don't want them back for hygiene reasons

[Grok]

Poppycock!

Crutches can and are hygienically cleaned and sterilised, and re-used. Return them to the hospital.

Unless of course seabag meant crotches.

Seabag Wrote:

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> Recycle them, the hospital don't want them back

> for hygiene reasons

[rendelharris]

Assuming the hospital is King's what Seabag says is quite correct - or at least it was last year. Some NHS trusts have a policy of sterilising and testing used mobility aids then reusing them, King's is one of the ones that say it costs more to sterilise and check them for safety than it does to issue new ones. So not poppycock at all.

OP: UCH A&E take back crutches, might be worth dropping them in there if you're ever up that way?

[Jeremy]

Yes, Kings won't want them back - they didn't want mine back in Feb (or whatever it was). If it's not Kings - worth calling I guess.

It does seem silly though... surely easy enough to clean them up and put on new rubber feet..

[rendelharris]

Jeremy Wrote:

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> Yes, Kings won't want them back - they didn't want

> mine back in Feb (or whatever it was). If it's not

> Kings - worth calling I guess.

>

> It does seem silly though... surely easy enough to

> clean them up and put on new rubber feet..

I was told when trying to return some after a rugby injury that they'd have to be scanned to check there were no internal fractures before being passed safe - but other authorities often issue pleas for their return. Sounds like something on which the Department of Health should issue a blanket guidance, it does seem a terrible waste of resources.

[alice]

sounds like the sort of thing which would be suited to the old sheltered workshops. but aren't they all closed now.

[Nigello]

Why not return them to the Dept of Health, with a covering letter, or at least a link to this thread? Could make a good picture story for a magazine/newspaper/campaign group, if you are interested in that kind of thing!

[Seabag]

Oh heaven please sake. They're cheap to make, and they'll be recycled.

Chuck the things in the green bin.

[rendelharris]

Seabag Wrote:

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> Oh heaven please sake. They're cheap to make, and

> they'll be recycled.

>

> Chuck the things in the green bin.

Well yes, but reusing is greener than recycling and still curious to know why King's don't take them back when many other hospitals throughout the country positively clamour for them. NHS crutches apparently cost ?23 a pair, so say King's give out ten pairs a day (surely a conservative estimate) that's somewhere north of ?85,000 per year, enough for three nurses or a consultant.

[Robert Poste's Child]

Stick a post in the For Sale section offering them free. There's sure to be someone local who needs them.

[uncleglen]

They should make them out of wood and leather like they used to....

[peckham_ryu]

rendelharris Wrote:

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> NHS crutches apparently cost ?23 a pair, so say King's give out ten pairs a day (surely a conservative estimate) that's somewhere north of ?85,000 per year, enough for three nurses or a consultant.

Just imagining how this kind of thing happens. I wouldn't be surprised of the story goes something like this...

Annual cost of chap to take care of crutch recycling:

?22k staff cost + ?4k office space and services + ?1k consumables

?someone does a calculation that Crutch Chap is under-utilised for 80% of his time and so they put his role in scope of some outsource contract or other, to save a notional ?20k per year (which they announce as a ?100k saving over the contract term).

Outsource contractor doesn't really want to do the crutch repair service, as they were after the more lucrative main business, so they deliberately price crutch repair at a prohibitively high rate. Now it's cheaper for the Trust to just bin the crutches and buy new ones. Contractor lets the Crutch Chap go, and the saving on staff costs goes to their bottom line without any benefit to the Trust.

Just a cynical flight of fancy there :)

[rendelharris]

peckham_ryu Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> Just imagining how this kind of thing happens. I

> wouldn't be surprised of the story goes something

> like this...

>

> Annual cost of chap to take care of crutch

> recycling:

> ?22k staff cost + ?4k office space and services +

> ?1k consumables

>

> ?someone does a calculation that Crutch Chap is

> under-utilised for 80% of his time and so they put

> his role in scope of some outsource contract or

> other, to save a notional ?20k per year (which

> they announce as a ?100k saving over the contract

> term).

>

> Outsource contractor doesn't really want to do the

> crutch repair service, as they were after the more

> lucrative main business, so they deliberately

> price crutch repair at a prohibitively high rate.

> Now it's cheaper for the Trust to just bin the

> crutches and buy new ones. Contractor lets the

> Crutch Chap go, and the saving on staff costs goes

> to their bottom line without any benefit to the

> Trust.

>

> Just a cynical flight of fancy there :)

And a witty and doubtless close to reality one, but that's an argument for overhauling the idiocy that's ruining the NHS, not against reusing crutches per se!

[maxxi]

Keep them and chalk the end, they make a deadly accurate pool cue.

[TheArtfulDogger]

The NHS really doesn't have a leg to stand on with this policy however it is as pointed out earlier down to the sterilisation costs and risk if cross infection (mrsa and its cousins ) that has seen the introduction of this insane policy

The princess Royal in Kent has a similar policy and there are rooms full of crutches and Zimmer frames ready to be disposed off as a result

Sheer madness

[LadyNorwood]

TheArtfulDogger Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> The NHS really doesn't have a leg to stand on with

> this policy however it is as pointed out earlier

> down to the sterilisation costs and risk if cross

> infection (mrsa and its cousins ) that has seen

> the introduction of this insane policy

>

> The princess Royal in Kent has a similar policy

> and there are rooms full of crutches and Zimmer

> frames ready to be disposed off as a result

>

> Sheer madness

"doesn't have a leg to stand on" - I see what you did there.....

[Tarot]

The crutches should be returned to the N.H,S. because some people are using them to make false benifit claims.

It will save money being recycled,and maybe stop wasted money on the N.H.S.