GB2598274A

GB2598274A - Independence vehicle

Info

Publication number: GB2598274A
Application number: GB2007889.5A
Authority: GB
Inventors: Colin Bull Jeffrey
Original assignee: Coachbuilt GB Ltd
Current assignee: Coachbuilt GB Ltd
Priority date: 2020-05-27
Filing date: 2020-05-27
Publication date: 2022-03-02
Also published as: GB202007889D0

Abstract

A wheelchair accessible independence vehicle 100 has an ingress/egress assistance mechanism such as a lift or ramp (Fig. 3, 114) and an elevating roof 134 moveable between a stowed condition and an elevated condition to provide additional vertical space within the vehicle for a carer. The vehicle may be a large passenger van and may comprise a sink, shower, wash table, wet room, toilet, and/or a medicine refrigerator. Additionally, a vehicle for transporting a quarantined person (Fig. 4, 200) is a large passenger van and comprises a segregated interior with a pressure differential between first and second portions (Fig. 5, 222, 224) to influence air flow. The first portion includes the driver’s seat (Fig. 5, 216), accessed via a driver’s door (Fig. 5, 208), and the second portion, accessed via an alternative door (Fig. 5, 212), is for occupation by a quarantined person. The alternative door may be a side door and the partition between the two portions (Fig. 5, 226) may be an air-impermeable screen. The vehicle may comprise an ingress/egress assistance mechanism and the size of the two portions may be changed by reconfiguring the partition.

Description

Independence vehicle The present invention is concerned with an independence vehicle. More specifically, the present invention is concerned with a vehicle the affords an independent lifestyle to those with medical conditions.

There are many medical conditions that detrimentally affect the lifestyle of people. Among those are reduced and disability causing the person to need to use a wheelchair. Dependence on a wheelchair causes an inherent problem with vehicle use. Most vehicles are not equipped for the ingress and egress of a wheelchair. Specialist vehicles are available, but these tend to be either large motor homes or mobility adapted cars.

Adapted motorhomes have the advantage that they can offer the space and height to provide living space for both the disabled person and a carer. Other facilities such as wheelchair lifts, ramps, disabled toilets, specialist bedding and showering facilities can be provided.. These vehicles are also designed to contain items of specialist medical and healthcare equipment required by the user when travelling, all of which are usable in the vehicle. The height of these vehicles allows a personal hoist be installed to allow the disabled person to be hoisted from a wheelchair and moved to enable use of the specialist equipment within the vehicle.

Furthermore there is ample headroom for a carer to assist and care for a disabled user, or for an ambulant disabled person to move about and use the equipment.

A disadvantage of such vehicles is their size. Whilst sufficiently spacious to allow the installation of, access to and use of all the healthcare and lifestyle equipment, they exceed 6 metres in length and 2 metres in width. As such they are cumbersome difficult to park on side roads, road sides, private driveways and cannot fit into height restricted and multi storey car parks or fit onto single car parking or disabled parking spaces.

Their practicality for use as an everyday form of transport is therefore severely limited.

At the other end of the spectrum are mobility enabled cars. These may allow ingress by a wheelchair, and can be parked almost anywhere, but do not contain the lifestyle or healthcare equipment needed by users with certain disabilities as part of their daily lives and as such greatly restricting their social mobility and confidence to travel. For example in the case of double incontinence, immediate access to a shower table/wet room facilities is essential, this becomes exponentially more difficult for incontinent wheelchair users who need hoisting. Adapted cars only meet the transport needs (as opposed to the lifestyle and healthcare needs) of the user and public disabled toilets are 'one size fits all' and do not offer any specialist facilities.

A further problem lies in the transport of those with infectious diseases. Many people need to be transported from one location to another (for example from a hospital to a care home or vice versa). It may be necessary for the person to be transported by a third party. If the person to be transported has a suspected infectious disease (for example SARS-CoV-2 causing COVID-19) it is desirable to protect the vehicle driver and any other occupants from the suspected infected person.

Currently, ambulances or large mobile quarantine vehicles may be used for such transport, but are highly specialist, operated by medical staff, prohibitively expensive and overengineered for known diseases with well understood transmission routes, such as respiratory viruses.

A further problem lies in the transportation of those in the 'most vulnerable group' when it comes to the medical implications of catching an infectious disease. Many people in this category may be required to be transported by or with a third party in their everyday lives and therefore at increased risk of infection during the journey. The current option of an ambulance or large mobile quarantine vehicles in this situation is not practical.

It is an aim of the present invention to overcome, or at least mitigate, the above problems.

According to a first aspect of the invention there is provided an independence vehicle comprising: an ingress! egress assistance mechanism comprising at least one of: a wheelchair lift configured to elevate an occupied wheelchair to a vehicle floor level; a wheelchair ramp for passage of an occupied wheelchair to a vehicle floor level; a personal lift configured to elevate a standing person to a vehicle floor level; and, an elevating roof moveable from a stowed condition and an elevated condition to provide additional vertical space within the vehicle.

Advantageously, such a vehicle facilitates independence of the disabled person by providing the ability to be driven and parked on public roads, side roads, road sides, private driveways, single car parking or disabled parking spaces and in height restricted and multi storey car parks. Further, the ability to create more headroom allows carer to assist the disabled person with access and ingress and egress and safely use the lifestyle and healthcare equipment or to enable the ambulant disabled person to safely use the equipment themselves whilst in the vehicle.

The subject vehicle is preferably of the 'panel van' type. By this we mean a vehicle in the M Euro car segment, and specifically in the large passenger van class. Such vehicles are four wheeled, are typically less than 6 metres long and less than 2 metres wide.

In order to provide the required degree of mobility and access to car parks, the vehicle is preferably less than 2 metres high with the elevated roof in a retracted / stowed position (when travelling). The vehicle height exceeds 2 metres with the roof in the elevated position.

In addition there are preferably items of healthcare and/or lifestyle equipment installed in the vehicle in various combinations and layouts. These may include; * wet room facilities; * cold medicine storage; * oxygen supply; * prone travelling equipment; * temperature controled areas; * private rest or 'quiet space'; * charging facilities for power wheelchairs; * medical devices; * changing facilities.

According to a second aspect of the invention there is provided a vehicle for transporting a quarantined person, which vehicle is in the M Euro car segment, and comprises a segregated interior 20 having: a first portion including the driver's seat, accessed via a one door; and, a second portion for occupation by an quarantined person, the second portion accessed via an alternative door; wherein the first and second portions are segregated by a partition to inhibit the transmission of microbes between the second portion and the first portion section to another in which there is a pressure differential between the first portion and the second portion to reduce or eliminate airflow from one of: the first portion to the second portion; and, the second portion to the first portion.

Advantageously, such a vehicle provides the ability to transport infectious people or those vulnerable to infection whilst minimising risk. Utilising an M Euro car segment vehicle also makes the vehicle affordable and able to be driven on most public roads and public car parks with ease by members of the public.

The second portion is designed specifically for ease of regular cleaning and disinfecting It will be noted that quarantined persons may be either infectious, or suspected infectious themselves or may be vulnerable to infection due to e.g. pre-existing conditions. The invention may cater for either of these. In the former case, the second portion is maintained at a lower pressure than the first portion. In the latter case, the second portion is maintained at a higher pressure to reduce the intake of air and therefore microbes.

Where the invention concerns transport for those most vulnerable to infection the easy clean and disinfect requirement would not necessarily be included.

In one embodiment, the partition may be reconfigurable (i.e. moveable) to alter the size and occupancy of each portion.

Examples of the present invention will now be described with reference to the accompanying Figures in which: Figure 1 is a side view of a first independence vehicle in accordance with the present invention in a first condition; Figure 2 is a side view of the vehicle of Figure 1 in a second condition; Figure 3 is a plan view of the vehicle of Figure 1; Figure 4 is a side view of a second vehicle in accordance with the present invention; Figure 5 is a plan view of the vehicle of Figure 4. First embodiment Turning to Figure 1, there is shown an independence vehicle 100 according to the present invention.

The vehicle 100 falls within the M Euro car segment, and in particular is classed as a 'large passenger van'. Such vehicles are also referred to as 'minivans' (particularly in the USA) and 'camper vans' when provided with elevating roofs and / or certain equipment for habitation, as will be discussed below. Example models are the Volkswagen Transporter (TM) and Mercedes VITO (TM). In the present embodiment, the vehicle has a total length of less than 5.5 metres, a height of less than 2 metres and a width of less than 2 metres.

The vehicle 100 comprises a vehicle body 102 supported on four wheels 104 on a ground surface 10 with ground level GL. The body 102 defines an interior floor 106 (Figure 3) at a floor level FL. A front driver door 108 and a front passenger door 110 are provided at the front of the vehicle 100. A side door 112 is provided on a lateral side of the body 102. The side door 112 is a sliding-type door and is motorised in this embodiment. In other embodiments, the further door may be a rear access door such as a lifting tailgate or barn-style (side hinged) rear door.

Directly adjacent to and below the side door 112 (or rear door if provided) there is provided a wheelchair lift (shown schematically at 114). The wheelchair lift 114 is configured to alternately elevate and lower an occupied wheelchair from the ground level GL to the vehicle floor level FL allowing ingress and egress of a wheelchair user. In an alternative embodiment, the wheelchair lift may take the form of a retractable ramp or person lift in which a standing person can be elevated through this distance.

At the front of the vehicle, a driver seat 116 and passenger seat 118 is provided, both of which can be rotated about a vertical axis from the forward-facing position to a rearward facing position. The seats 116, 118 may be 6-way seats, allowing transfer from a wheelchair to the respective seat. The driver seat 116 is adjacent the driving controls 120 allowing the occupant to drive the vehicle.

Within the vehicle there is provided several items of healthcare equipment. It will be noted that the combination of equipment may be selected from a number of different items, but in particular will be selected from the following: * A sink 122; * A shower 124 with a screen 125;

* A wash table 126;

* A wet room 128; * A toilet 130; * A medicine refrigerator 132.

All of these items provide for the need of persons with reduced mobility and disability.

Turning back to Figures 1 and 2, instead of a normal flat roof, the body 102 is provided with an elevating roof 134. In the present embodiment, the elevating roof 134 spans the entire length and width of the body roof portion, but in other embodiments may be less.

The elevating roof 134 is moveable between a stowed condition in Figure 1 to an elevated condition in Figure 2 whereby at least part the roof has been moved upwardly away from the rest of the body 102. In doing so, the headroom HR in the vehicle (measured from the floor level FL to a ceiling level CL) has increased.

Any increase in headroom HR in the vehicle is advantageous as this allows easier movement for a standing occupant such as a carer. In this embodiment, the headroom HR has moved to at least 2 metres in at least one location within the vehicle to allow most people to stand upright.

The elevating roof 134 in the present embodiment moves by a combination of linear displacement in the vertical direction and rotation about a lateral horizontal axis to a tilted, elevated position (Figure 2). It will be noted that other types of elevating roofs are available and would be appropriate for implementation in the present invention. For example elevating roofs that simply lift (i.e. vertically displace) from one position to another would work, as would roofs that simply rotate! tilt about the front or rear edge.

Second embodiment The second embodiment is designed for the transportation of infectious or potentially infectious individuals.

Turning to Figures 4 and 5, there is shown an isolation vehicle 200 according to the present invention. The vehicle 200 falls within the M Euro car segment, and in particular is classed as a 'large passenger van'. Such vehicles are also referred to as 'minivans' (particularly in the USA). Example models are the Volkswagen Transporter (TM) and Mercedes VITO (TM). In the present embodiment, the vehicle has a total length of less than 5.5 metres, a height of less than 2 metres and a width of less than 2 metres.

The vehicle 200 comprises a vehicle body 202 supported on four wheels 204 on a ground surface 20 with ground level GL. The body 202 defines an interior floor 206 (Figure 3) at a floor level FL. A front driver door 208 and a front passenger door 210 are provided at the front of the vehicle 200. A side door 212 is provided on a lateral side of the body 202. The side door 212 is a sliding-type door and is motorised in this embodiment.

Directly below the side door 212 there is provided a wheelchair lift (shown schematically at 214). The wheelchair lift 214 is configured to alternately elevate and lower an occupied wheelchair from the ground level GL to the vehicle floor level FL allowing ingress and egress of a wheelchair user. In an alternative embodiment, the wheelchair lift may take the form of a retractable ramp or person lift in which a standing person can be elevated through this distance.

At the front of the vehicle, a driver seat 216 and passenger seat 218 is provided, The driver seat 216 is adjacent the driving controls 220 allowing the occupant to drive the vehicle.

The vehicle interior is separated into a first portion 222 and a second portion 224. The first portion 222 includes the driver's seat 216, accessed via a driver's door 208. In this embodiment, the first portion also includes the front passenger's seat. The second portion 224 is accessed via the side door 212.

The first and second portions 222, 224 are segregated by a partition 226 to inhibit the transmission of microbes from the second portion 224 to the first portion 222. An air management system 228 is provided to create a positive pressure differential between the first portion 222 and the second portion 224 to reduce or eliminate airflow from the second portion 224 to the first portion 222. This reduces the risk of airborne microbial transfer between the two portions. The apparatus 228 may operate by creating a sub-ambient pressure in the second compartment 224 (for example by filtering and pumping air to the exterior of the vehicle), or alternatively the air pressure in first portion 222 may be raised above that of the second portion 224.

The vehicle further comprises an intercom between the portions 222, 224 to permit two-way communications The intercom may be wired or wireless, and many such products are available on the market.

Third embodiment The third embodiment is designed for the transportation of vulnerable individuals.

The third embodiment is similar to the second embodiment, but the air management system 228 is provided to create a positive pressure differential between the second portion 222 and the first portion 224 to reduce or eliminate airflow from the first portion 224 to the second portion 222. This reduces the risk of airborne microbial transfer between the two portions, and serves to protect a vulnerable passenger in the second portion. The apparatus 228 may operate by creating an above ambient pressure in the second compartment 224 (for example by filtering and pumping air to the portion), or alternatively the air pressure in first portion 222 may be lowered below that of the second portion 224.

According to the present invention there is also provided a method of adapting a vehicle to include the features described with respect to the first and / or second embodiment above. An 'off the shelf' vehicle may be fitted with the elevating roof and wheelchair lift of the first embodiment, or the isolation portion of the second embodiment.

Fourth / fifth embodiment The fourth and fifth embodiments are variations of the second and third embodiments respectively. In each of the fourth and fifth embodiments the partition 226 is reconfigurable. In other words, the partition may be reconfigured to adjust the respective areas in plan (i.e. volumes) of the first and second portions within the vehicle.

Reconfiguration may take place in a number of ways, including but not limited to: * the partition being constructed from a flexible sheet that can be attached to the vehicle interior at a plurality of positions to provide a plurality of configurations; * the partition being constructed from a single panel that can be moved along the length of the vehicle between positions; and, * the partition being constructed from a plurality of panels that may be independently repositioned.

In this way, the partition 226 may be moved between positions to vary the size and / or occupancy of the first and second portions. For example, in one configuration there may be provided a first row of seats (driver and front passenger), with the partition immediately behind them. In another configuration of the same vehicle a further row of passenger seats may be provided behind the driver and passenger, the further row also being in the first portion (i.e. not quarantined). The partition is provided behind the further row in this configuration.

Claims

Claims 1. An independence vehicle comprising: an ingress / egress assistance mechanism comprising at least one of: a wheelchair lift configured to elevate an occupied wheelchair to a vehicle floor level; a wheelchair ramp for passage of an occupied wheelchair to a vehicle floor level; and, a personal lift configured to elevate a standing person to a vehicle floor level; and, an elevating roof moveable from a stowed condition and an elevated condition to provide additional vertical space within the vehicle.
2. An independence vehicle according to claim 1, in which the vehicle is in the M Euro car segment in the large passenger van class.
3. An independence vehicle according to claim 1 or 2, which vehicle is less than 5.5 metres long, less than 2 metres wide and less than 2 metres high with the elevating roof in the stowed condition.
4. An independence vehicle according to any preceding claim, comprising one or more features selected from the following list: a sink; a shower;a wash table;a wet room; a toilet; and, a medicine refrigerator.
5. A vehicle for transporting a quarantined person, which vehicle is in the M Euro car segment in the large passenger van class, and comprises a segregated interior having: a first portion including the driver's seat, accessed via a driver's door; and, a second portion for occupation by a quarantined person, the second portion accessed via an alternative door; wherein the first and second portions are segregated by a partition to inhibit the transmission of microbes between the second portion and the first portion, in which there is a pressure differential between the first portion and the second portion to reduce or eliminate airflow from one of: the first portion to the second portion; and, the second portion to the first portion.7. A vehicle according to claim 5, wherein the second portion is maintained at a higher pressure than the first portion.8. A vehicle according to claim 5, wherein the first portion is maintained at a higher pressure than the second portion.9. A vehicle according to any of claims 5 to 8, wherein the alternative door is a side door.10. A vehicle according to any of claims 5 to 9, wherein the partition comprises an air-impermeable screen.11. A vehicle according to any of claims 5 to 10, comprising an ingress / egress assistance mechanism comprising at least one of: a wheelchair lift configured to elevate an occupied wheelchair to a vehicle floor level; a wheelchair ramp; and, a personal lift configured to elevate a standing person to a vehicle floor level.12. A vehicle according to any of claims 5 to 11, having at least two configurations, wherein the size of the first and second portions is different in the at least two configurations.13. A vehicle according to claim 12, wherein the partition is reconfigurable between the at least two configurations.