Lifting disabled patients onto the densitometer with a ceiling lift: Effect of the sling on measurement of BMD

摘要

Objective: Lifting disabled patients onto a densitometer manually is dangerous for both the patient and the densitometry staff; using a ceiling lift is the preferred method of transfer. This system requires the use of a sling underneath the patient. Unless extra time is taken for its removal, the sling remains underneath the patient as bone mineral density (BMD) is measured. The aim of this study was to determine whether leaving this sling in place during scan acquisition affects the BMD measurement.Methods: Measurements were taken of a spine phantom 30 times by itself, 30 times with a standard sling underneath the spine phantom, and 16 times with a disposable sling underneath the spine phantom.Results: We found that mean BMD was significantly different versus the phantom alone when a sling was used, due to differences in area, bone mineral content, or both. The disposable sling affected the mean BMD to a much greater extent than did the standard sling (+1.9% vs. -0.41%; P for the difference between slings <.001). The standard sling did not increase the variance in the BMD measurement compared with the spine phantom alone, whereas the disposable sling did increase the variance in the BMD measurements.Conclusion: Commercially available ceiling-lift slings affect BMD measurements of spine phantoms. This effect is expected to persist when BMD is measured in patients and suggests that when lifting a patient onto the densitometer using these slings, it is best to take the time to remove the sling from under the patient after transfer and before scanning.