Purpose Idea is of a stretcher that can be used on stairs and in hilly terrains, where vehicles and ambulances cannot reach. In hilly areas, there is no access to ambulances hence people have to carry the patient on their shoulders or the patients have to walk themselves. Hence this stretcher would make it easier to take the patient to hilly areas or stairs.
Technical details Instead of tires it would have numerous free movement metal balls attached to its bottom surface and this bottom surface would be allowed to have free movement in the horizontal axis, with respect to another surface (no relative movement about the stretcher) above it, these surfaces would have self-aligning ball bearings in between them. This surface would eventually connect to the stretcher bed with the help of rods and would have shock-absorbing struts. The free-moving metal balls would allow easy movement on non-uniform surfaces which are very common in hilly areas, also a large number of these metal balls would make the movement of stretcher easier on the stairs, which are fairly common in all terrains. The free movement of the bottom surface would also serve the same cause as the metal balls and rather enhance it. The connection of the surfaces with the ball bearings would reduce friction between them and their self-alignment property would help to reduce friction along with all the directions. The rods would connect the surfaces with the stretcher bed and the shock-absorbing struts would resist compression produced during the movement and hence would prevent the patient from any shock.
Benefits This will help the patients in such undulated areas.
Suggested Reading(s): Guha, S. K., & Anand, S. (1989). A new
stretcher design for easy manoeuvrability on narrow staircases and rough
ground for developing countries. Proceedings of the Institution of Mechanical Engineers,
Part H: Journal of Engineering in Medicine, 203(1), 55-60. India Science, (2021). DRDO-CRPF bike
ambulance Rakshita. Retrieved on June 23, 2021, from https://www.indiascience.in/videos/drdo-crpf-bike-ambulance-rakshita-e Iwano, Y., Osuka, K., & Amano, H. (2011).
Development of rescue support stretcher system with stair-climbing. In 2011 IEEE International Symposium on Safety, Security, and Rescue
Robotics (pp. 245-250). IEEE.
