Patent Application
20090299240
The invention relates to a cast and bandage protector, for use during showers and bathing.
Casts have been used for hundreds of years to protect set, broken bones. There are two basis types of casts: plaster of paris and fiberglass. Although more expensive, fiberglass has certain advantages over plaster, such as lighter in weight, generally longer wearing and often more durable.
Regardless of whether a cast is plaster or fiberglass, they typically have cotton padding in their interior facing the patient's skin surface in order to protect the skin and underlying bones from direct contact or pressure caused by the cast. It is important that neither the cast nor the cotton padding get wet. For example, the cast must be kept dry when bathing or showering. Although a fiberglass cast is impervious to water damage, if the cotton lining becomes wet it may cause skin irritation and possible skin breakdown. Also, moisture will cause the skin to become itchy, and the warm moisture may increase the susceptibility to infection. As a result of the above issues, flexible elastic sleeves have been developed which are used to enshroud either the fiberglass or plaster cast. These elastic sleeves are generally known and commonly sold.
One such prior art sleeve is represented by U.S. Pat. No. 4,639,945 to Betz issued Feb. 3, 1987. Betz provides an elongated flexible plastic sleeve that uses a gasket-like arrangement formed within a surrounding sealing ring. The problem, however, with such sealing ring gasket configurations is that the ring is usually made of semi-rigid waterproof material, which both increases manufacturing expense and prohibits neat and snug folding within a compact package.
This latter point can be significant since store shelf packaging space is important in getting medical device dispensing stores to shelve a product. Put another way, high manufacturing expense and bulky packaging will prevent general store acceptance for shelf display.
Yet another problem with cast protectors for consumer acceptance is that the sleeve must be configured such that it can be easily put on and taken off, and the sleeve must be able to accommodate casts for the arm, for example, that are just simply forearm casts or for the entire arm that need to accommodate the possibility of a 90° bend, for example, at the elbow. This similar situation exists for the leg, ankle and knee. That is to say that one cast protector needs to be available for the entirety of the arm, whether only a forearm cast or a complete arm cast; and similarly one cast protector size needs to be available for the leg in this same way. The number of variations that need to be manufactured can therefore be lessened, even further decreasing manufacturing expense.
It is therefore an object of the present invention to provide a waterproof shield or sleeve which for bandages or casts that can easily be applied and effectively seal the limb in order to prevent water accessing the cast over bandage, during, for example, bathing or showering.
Another object of the present invention is to provide the above advantages and objectives with a system which is economical to make, and which eliminates the high expense of a separate sealing ring.
A yet further object of the present invention is to provide the above advantages with a cast and bandage protector which can be folded over upon itself for easy, efficient packaging.
An even further objective of the present invention is to provide a cast protector which is a flexible sleeve design to allow easy pull on and take off and which has sufficient flexibility, i.e., a widened area to accommodate up to a 90° bends at covered joints, such as elbows, ankles and knees.
The foregoing and other objects and advantages of this invention will become apparent to those skilled in the art upon reading the description of a preferred embodiment which follows in conjunction with the below described drawings.
Cast and bandage protector that avoids use of a sealing ring and therefore can be folded over upon itself, has suitability for convenient packaging and at the same time still provides an effective waterproof sealing arrangement.
The flexible sleeve can be made from any polymeric plastic material, usually transparent since user's like to see through it. Flexible sleeves can be made from polymeric, poly vinyl chloride, polyurethane or other alpha olefin from polymers, i.e., polyethylene, polypropylene, etc.
In using the cast and bandage protector as illustrated in
While the embodiments of this invention shown and described are fully capable of achieving the objects and advantages desired, it is to be understood that such embodiments have been shown for purposes of illustration only, and not for purposes of limitation with the claims below, providing the meets and bounds of the invention.
