17/08/2025
The Right Equipment for the Job
Having the right equipment, the right personnel and the right skills is the most important part of safely transferring your loved one into our care. People do not just die in a hospital or Care Home setting or safely in their beds. A person may die in any room at any time of day, doing any number of tasks.
How would you get someone who has died out of a bathroom or from behind the front door, of both a hall or bathroom that you can only fit one person into? A bariatric person down a flight of stairs that the staircase is only wide enough for two people?
The answer to both is equipment and skilled staff.
The equipment that we have available to us here at Eastons is several multi-level stretchers, including a bariatric stretcher, a track stretcher for taking a person who has died down a flight of stairs, a morti pod that allows us to safely slide the person who has died including a bariatric down a flight of stairs and several carry mats and glide sheets.
Case Study
Person living alone comes in the front door into a narrow hallway, shuts the front door and hangs their coat up, has a medical event and dies. Family attends the house as they couldn’t get hold of the person and notice them behind the front door. They manage to gain entry through the back door and call the ambulance as they can not see any movement, the person is not responding and they can see blood at the persons head area. Ambulance crew attend and one of the crew manages to gain access to the person through a very narrow space in the living room door that opens into the hall. The crew establish there is no signs of life and not knowing how long the person has been like this, confirm the person has died. They inform the family that the person has died and that because the death was not expected the Police must be informed. The ambulance crew inform control who request Police attendance. The person who has died has an extensive medical history. The police attend and establish the death is not suspicious and likely a medical death. The Police inform the family they can contact the funeral director of their choice. Family contacts our team here at Easton’s, after taking some details and speaking to the Police Officer we establish this is a medical death and as such may or may not be certified by the GP. Straight away we know we are only able to transfer the person into our care; we cannot do anything else at this stage until the death has been certified. The death may require further Fiscal involvement if the GP will not certify.
We attend as a three-man crew, instead of our usual two. We do not know exactly what we will find when we arrive. The Police officer in attendance briefs us on arrival and instructs us not to do anything with the person who has died until certification from the GP or instruction from the Fiscal.
We find the person between the living room and front doors; the ambulance crew have cleaned the person up and covered them up with a blanket. We know we will need a body bag, our usual Ferno multi-level stretcher, and in this case a carry mat. Only one person can fit behind the door so we will need to move the person so the living room door can open. We do not know what fluid leakage we have, so we have full PPE on long sleaved surgical gown, and gloves. We go behind the door with the carry mat. Log rolling the person who has died we place the carry mat in at on side, then repeat at the other side. Once under the person we can now safely slide the person away from the door to allow it to open wide. With the assistance of the Police Officers, we will check the person who has died for any belongings, document and remove these and return to the family along with any clothing, only underwear will remain on the person who has died. It is worth mentioning at this stage, clothing may have been cut by the Ambulance Crew to render lifesaving assistance. The multi level stretcher will not make it into the hall way, so will have to be positioned as close to the door at floor level, The bag is placed on the stretcher, using the carry mat the person is lifted onto the bag and the bag is then zipped up, the person is secured using the securing belts and the stretcher is returned to the normal working hight. Before leaving we get the family to sign the person who has died into our care on our tracker form and gather any paperwork left by the Ambulance crew. We secure the person into the van, with a member of the team remaining with the person who has died at all times. We return to the family to answer any questions the family may have and to recap the next steps, before leaving and returning to the funeral home.
What the case study demonstrates is that with the right equipment the amount of moving and handling is reduced and the person who has died can be transferred safely into our care with dignity and respect at all times.
I have included pictures of some of the equipment we have available and mainly the ones we have mentioned above. I hope this has been informative to you and allows you to understand why as Funeral Directors we have moved away from the coffin and a hearse for brining your loved one into our care.
