Anyone who has spent time on a hospital ward either as a medical practitioner or as a patient can attest to the fact that an electric hospital bed is one of the most widely used pieces of specialised equipment in a hospital.
As with a lot of vital equipment found in a hospital, the adjustable bed evolved somewhat gradually from existing makeshift equipment over the course of a century into a dedicated, specialist piece of furniture, with contributions from all across the medical and engineering world.
The earliest developments emerged somewhat independently. Adjustable side rails essential for safely moving a hospital bed and ensuring people do not fall out of bed appeared at some point in the early 19th century, whilst a patent was registered for a hinged mattress frame in 1874.
The earliest modern hospital bed as we understand the concept today was the Gatch bed, developed by Willis Dew Gatch in 1909 whilst he was in charge of the Department of Surgery at the School of Medicine at Indiana University.
The bed has three segments, which allow for the head to be elevated and the foot to be lowered to make it more comfortable for a patient to sit up and to get up if they are struggling with their mobility.
Initially adjusting the bed was a complex, involved process, but this was initially fixed thanks to the involvement of Henry Ford according to an obituary of Dr Gatch.
Mr Ford spotted the bed in use at a hospital in Detroit, Michigan, when he suggested and designed a crank and screw arrangement that became a ubiquitous part of the Gatch bed.
It remained the standard for hospital beds for decades. However, Dr Marvel Darlington Beem developed an all-in-one bed solution that allowed for the bed to be adjusted by the patients themselves using a set of electric switches.
Initially intended to provide built-in toileting facilities, this part of the modern adjustable bed was ironically the first to be eschewed when competitors were developed.