Every day, behavioral health facilities strive to create environments that are safe and comfortable for patients and staff to occupy. However, designing and creating this type of environment can be challenging. Every room requires furnishings with minimal or no ligature points depending on the supervision and risk factors of its occupants. Thankfully, quality ligature-resistant furniture reduces these potential risks and offers many benefits for mental health centers to help create comfortable and healing environments. Read on to learn more about this type of furniture and its various features.
What Is Ligature-Resistant Furniture?
Ligature-resistant furniture is furniture designed to minimize ligature points that could allow opportunities for patient self-harm. Features such as smooth, rounded edges; the ability to weigh or bolt down; and tamper-resistant hardware all fall under the umbrella of ligature-resistant features that you will find in this type of furniture.
Ligature-Resistant Features
When searching for ligature-resistant behavioral health furniture, there are two main components you should consider: the material and the design. The material itself must be durable and virtually unbreakable to prevent potential danger. One example of a strong, quality material is rotationally molded polyethylene. At Cortech USA, we manufacture all of our behavioral health furniture with high-impact polyethylene for increased strength and durability. As for the design, we construct all of our products without any seams, sharp edges, or dangerous corners that could cause harm to patients or staff. Additional features include comfortable designs, the ability to add weight or bolt to the floor, and easy cleanability.
Support Patients & Staff
The main benefit that ligature-resistant furniture provides mental health facilities with is increased safety. When high-quality materials are met with carefully planned designs, patients and staff are less likely to incur physical injuries and can therefore enjoy safe, comfortable spaces that will lead to positive outcomes and behaviors.