Recommendations on Standards for the Design of Medical Diagnostic Equipment for Adults with Disabilities, Advisory Committee Final Report

4.1.1 Range of Examination Table and Chair Configurations

Examination tables and chairs are used wherever patients are examined throughout the health care delivery system. Therefore, tables and chairs must support a wide range of diagnostic activities, clinical indications, and patient populations. These demands have implications for the design, configuration, and principles of operation of examination tables and chairs. Broadly speaking, this equipment falls into two categories based on the positioning of the patient undergoing examination, those encompassed by the M301 and M302 criteria of the U.S. Access Board’s NPRM for MDE accessibility (see Section 1.3.1 and Tables 1.3.1(a) and 1.3.1(b)):

1. Equipment designed for patients in prone or side-lying positions (M301)

• Examination tables

• Podiatry tables

2. Equipment designed for patients seated or in semi-supine positions (M302)

• Examination chairs

• Dental chairs

• Optometric chairs

• Otolaryngology (ENT) chairs

• Phlebotomy chairs

• Podiatry chairs

As noted in the NPRM for MDE accessibility standards, when equipment is designed to support more than one patient position, the equipment would have to meet the technical criteria for each position supported. The word “prone” describes persons “lying on their stomachs” or “fronts” – in more technical language, in a ventral position. “Supine” indicates persons lying on their backs or with their faces facing upward. There are many positions between prone and supine, indicated by such terminology as semi-supine, Fowlers, semi-Fowlers, and semi-recumbent. For setting standards, these intermediate positions might be best considered in the M302 criteria. Some examination tables can be configured to have patients in either prone or seated positions (both M301 and M302 standards). Manufacturers design examination chairs that have, as their primary function, the support of patients in a seated or semi-supine position. While some chairs are capable of fully reclining, this is a secondary rather than primary functionality. In general, examination chairs are not designed for use in the prone or side-lying position.