WO2002038089A1

WO2002038089A1 - An apparatus for aiding a woman in urinating in a standing position

Info

Publication number: WO2002038089A1
Application number: PCT/FI2001/000966
Authority: WO
Inventors: And Demir; Catja Correa
Original assignee: Scimer Research And Diagnostics Oy
Priority date: 2000-11-07
Filing date: 2001-11-07
Publication date: 2002-05-16
Also published as: AU2002214071A1; FIU20000446U0

Abstract

The present invention relates to an apparatus for aiding a woman in urinating in a standing position. More particularly, this invention relates to a portable, foldable, disposable, biodegradable and leakproof sanitary product that conforms comfortably to the body and directs the urine away from the body to exterior disposal, allowing women to urinate without sitting down. Its light, compact, collapse/emerge folding design is convenient and discrete, and the product has a disposable design intended to be used only once. The apparatus according to the invention is characterized in that it is foldable and leakproof and has a flat-design with two layers, which are either natural folded extensions of each other or simply affixed to each other on the sides.

Description

An apparatus for aiding a woman in urinating in a standing position

Field of the invention

The present invention relates to an apparatus for aiding a woman in urinating in a standing position.

Background of the invention

For health reasons and for convenience it is desirable to enable a woman to urinate in an upright or standing position. The danger (real or imaginary) of contracting disease from toilet seats, especially in public restrooms, causes many women to either avoid using public facilities or to attempt to urinate without touching the toilet seat with their bodies. The latter alternative, however, has proven to be an unsatisfactory solution to the problem due to the fact that it sometimes leads to contaminating one's own skin, soiling of clothing, etc. Frequently, the state of sanitation in public facilities is not entirely adequate, particularly if the facilities have been used by persons of both genders. With the spread of infectious diseases and increasing public awareness about biological hazards of contagious agents, many women refuse to come into bodily contact with public toilets and elect to urinate while standing. Use of toilet seat covers and the like does not always solve the problem since positioning the covers on the seat sometimes entails touching the seat itself, which as noted is undesirable. Additionally, many women participate in vocations and/or hobbies, such as aviation, camping, hunting, hiking etc., which do not permit the woman to find or use a bathroom equipped with a toilet, when such facilities are needed.

Because of a woman's anatomy, it is difficult or impossible for her to urinate directionally. The woman is thus unable to urinate from any distance into a receptacle, in a manner which would enable the woman to avoid direct contact with the receptacle, and also to have the ability of using receptacles other than sit-down toilets. It is therefore desirable for a woman to have a neat, convenient and sanitary device to facilitate directional urination while the woman is in an upright position, to be used in a bathroom facility or for urinating into a receptacle elsewhere. However, the said solution should not compromise the convenience of the user in carrying such a device along, preparing it for its ready-to-use position and finally disposing of it after use. It should also be desirable that it should not pose any environmental drawbacks following its disposal and should not hinder its widespread use due to such concerns.

There are several known devices to facilitate urination by women in an upright position or to aid in collection of urine samples from women. Its historical background extends back to 1963, when Hadley described sanitary feminine hand urinals in his patent publication (US3114916).

U.S. Patent 4,815,151 - Ball discloses a urinary guide apparatus which is shaped to the contours of the female genital region and is secured in place manually or by means of specially constructed undergarments, for use by the incontinent who need the device to remain in position. The apparatus defines a urethral orifice by which urine passes from the user to a flexible disposal tube. The orifice is aligned with ridges and the like, and is positioned differently for users of different sizes or ages.

U.S. Patents 4,568,339 - Steer; 3,964,111 - Packer; and 4,771,484 - Mozell disclose funnel-shaped apparatus designed for conducting urine away from the user's body. Packer and Mozell both disclose multi-piece devices with interior disposal liners. Use of the Packer and Mozell devices requires the user to dispose of the liner and keep the urinary device for further use. Steer's device includes a flange for connection to a cut-out pair of conventional panties.

Some of these devices, such as those described in U.S. Pat. Nos. 3,995,329 and 4,496,355, are adapted to be positioned inside the labia folds of the user's vaginal cavity. The placing of foreign objects within this region is objectionable for medical and hygienic reasons particularly when the device is to be reused a number of times. These internal devices, because of their construction, are oftentimes difficult to cleanse after each use and thus pose a very real health hazard.

Urinal devices have also been developed for use by women which are adapted to be fitted externally over the mouth of the vulva in proper alignment with the urethra. These external devices are generally fabricated of plastic, hard rubber, stiff cardboard or other similarly hard materials which, when pressed securely against the woman's sensitive vulvar region, can cause irritation. For the most part these devices do not contain disposable inserts or liners which might be removed and easily discarded after use. As a consequence the device must be thoroughly cleansed after each use to avoid unwanted odors and other sanitary related problems. Examples of these types of rigid reusable devices can be found in U.S. Pat. Nos. 1,407,872 and 3,411,916 as well as in 3,613,122.

In U.S. Pat. No. 4,202,058 there is disclosed a female urinal having a rigid cuplike outer shell and a flexible inner liner that protrudes outward beyond the shell's upper opening. The liner is folded over the opening to cushion the rim area for the comfort and protection of the user. The liner is not disposable and both it and the outer shell must be cleaned after each use. The device is specifically designed to be used by a woman who is bedridden and must urinate in a supine position. U.S. Pat. No. 190,244 also describes an unlined hard rubber urinal for use by invalids or the like who cannot leave their beds.

U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,528,703 and 4,023,219 disclose reusable urinal devices that assists women in urinating while in a standing position. Each of these devices has a flexible pad or membrane surrounding the entrance of a rigid cup which contacts the vulva region. The pad prevents unwanted leakage from the cup and also is used as a wiping instrument to remove excess moisture from the contacted body region after use. In the latter patent, the pad is a multilayered horseshoe device that surrounds the rear lip of the collector. The top layer of the pad is formed of soft moisture absorbent paper and the inner layer is formed of a stiffer casein or gelatine material that dissolves in water. The pad can be removed from the device after use and flushed into a sanitary drain system without harm. It should be noted that the collector does not contain a disposable liner or the like. All the above-mentioned devices are difficult to clean and store after they have been used and are generally ill fitting and uncomfortable when being used.

For instance, as in the case of U.S. Pat. No. 4,771,484, which approaches the disposability concept by utilizing a removable liner to some extent, still comes with a rigid, non-disposable, non-recyclable, non-biodegradable part, which forms the bottleneck constraint for such a product to gain wide public use because it requires the user to keep the urinary device for further use. Finally, the patent application by Witzke (EP0464575) is again approaching one more step towards solving the problem of portability of such a device by offering a design which can be collapsed for storage in a package; however, this design comes with a semi-rigid part as well as a rigid 'conducting tube', which makes it still unpractical to use comfortably and particularly to dispose of. Besides, its design is based on two separate units of different material (including plastic), which complicates its recyclability even more. Furthermore, from the point of view of the manufacturing industry, this proposed design of such a disposable product is still rather costly and hardly feasible towards mass production for general public use.

To be considered efficient and to be useful to women as they travel, a device of this type should be functional for direction of urinary flow without any leaking, and also easily carried along in a pocket, handbag or the like. Besides, considering the nature of use and the time allocated for such use in public toilets, etc., its industrial design should provide an innovative solution so that preparing the said device for its ready-to-use position is very easy and time- efficient for the user. Disposition after use should also be very practical for the same reasons. It should also be desirable that the device itself is disposable and preferably biodegradable, for the convenience of the user as well as in order to avoid environmental concerns. Finally, overall features of its industrial design should allow the producer to maintain its manufacturing costs at such minimal levels to be able to materialize an economically viable and feasible production of such a device, which is to be used in conjunction with such a rather frequently occurring daily need even under normal conditions.

Summary of the invention

It is an object of the present invention to provide an apparatus for aiding a woman in urinating in a standing position. The apparatus according to the invention is characterised in that it is foldable and leakproof and has a flat- design with two layers, which are either natural folded extensions of each other or simply affixed to each other on the sides. More particularly, this invention relates to a portable, foldable, disposable, biodegradable and leakproof sanitary product that conforms comfortably to the body and directs the urine away from the body to exterior disposal, allowing women to urinate without sitting down. Its light, compact, collapse/emerge folding design is convenient and discrete, and the product preferably has a disposable design intended to be used only once. The innovative flat design with appropriate folding lines revolutionizes the way a whole handful-size funnel can be carried along in a small pocket or handbag. Furthermore, disposal after use is a very practical issue thanks to the disposable, biodegradable product design. Urination funnel's shape is designed anatomically in accordance with the contours of human female body. It protects women of all ages in unsanitary toilet conditions, because the user does not have to sit during urination. It is an invention which will help all women who are particularly conscious about hygiene.

One of the most useful sites of use for such an apparatus can be medical settings such as clinical wards, where post-surgery patients may prefer to urinate while standing due to pain or discomfort in the groin and/or perineal region, and laboratories, where urine samples may be taken more conveniently under aseptic conditions by the help of such device.

The present invention provides a flat-design apparatus with appropriate folding lines on two attached layers, which can easily be turned into a funnel to enable a woman to safely and hygienically urinate in a standing position, comprising a flexible funnel rim contoured to sealingly engage the vulvar region of a female and having a larger front radius and a smaller back radius. The said funnel body has a substantially continuous wall sloped inwardly and towards the front of said funnel body, said funnel body terminating in an orifice. Accordingly, when held in place the rim engages the female's vulvar region and urine passed from the female's urethra is collected in the funnel to flow out the orifice.

The flat design is characterized by two layers which are either natural, folded extensions of each other or simply affixed to each other on the sides. The two layers in question form the walls of the funnel when squeezed from the sides - insertion of an aiding instrument like a finger between the two layers before squeezing may facilitate the process of building the funnel shape.

The funnel can be manufactured as a leakproof device simply by coating inner walls of the said apparatus smoothly by varnish dispersion (polyethylene or the like), which would not compromise the biodegradability of the urination device. Paper, paperboard, biodegradable plastics or the like can be the choice of material for providing the biodegradability of the whole device. The material in question and its thickness should be selected for optimum utility features, such as feel, comfort, foldability, portability and ease of disposability. Brief description of the drawings

For a better understanding of the present invention reference is made to the following detailed description of the present invention which is to be read in conjunction with the accompanying drawings, wherein:

FIG. 1(a) is a lateral perspective view of the apparatus according to the present invention (the flat design); (b) and (c) show the foldable nature of the apparatus according to the present invention;

FIG. 2(a) shows the way of preparing the apparatus according to the invention into a form where it can be used; arrows indicate the direction of squeezing; (b) is a front perspective view of the device: the emerging funnel constructed after squeezing from the sides;

FIG. 3 illustrates the positioning of the device by a user; and

FIG. 4 illustrates the usage of the device.

Detailed description of the invention

The device 1 as shown in Fig. 1(a) is turned into a funnel as depicted in Fig. 2 by squeezing from the sides; arrows 2, 3 in Fig. 2(a) indicate the direction of squeezing - insertion of a finger in-between the layers as shown by arrow 8 may help the process of forming the funnel from its original, collapsed position.

Funnel device 1 is to be positioned to engage the user's body 5 adjacent the urethra, defining an enclosure opening toward the user in a funnel 1 for confining urine, and directing the urine as required (as shown in Figs. 3 and 4). Rim 4 of the funnel 1 is flexible and is designed to fit the contours of the female genital anatomy, completely covering the vulvar region and forming a single enlarged opening by which urine is passed from the user's external urethral orifice to the flexible funnel body for collection. Rim 4 is closely secured to the user in a substantially sealing manner, by hand or by leg pressure, in such that urine does not pass beyond the edges of rim. Walls of funnel 1 are angled downwardly to direct the passage of fluid toward the funnel 1 orifice, by gravity as well as by the flow pressure of the urine current. Funnel 1 is preferably constructed of a flexible material such as paper, and its inner walls coated with a leakproof, however still biodegradable material, which are both inexpensive to produce and which can deal with liquid without leakage or seepage. Wall is sufficiently flexible to be easily folded against rim 4 and further into folds through multiple folding lines 9 for storage of the apparatus in a collapsed configuration, as seen in Figs. 1(a), (b) and (c).

In a preferred embodiment, the two flat layers with folding lines 9 allow emergence of a funnel following squeezing from sides 2, 3, where said flat layers form the conical walls of the funnel when squeezed from the sides 2, 3. The apparatus 1 becomes an emerging funnel from a flat designed bi-layer apparatus, emerging as a conical shaped container with an oval shaped top opening 10 and a smaller bottom opening 11 that is situated toward the front of the cup, the central axis of said bottom opening 11 being inclined at an angle with regard to the central axis of said top opening 10 to point in a forward direction of said funnel 1, which is aimed at conducting the urine towards the smaller bottom opening 11.

As urine is released into funnel 1, it is led down walls directly for passage through and out the orifice. Edges 6, 7 of the funnel 1 are sealed in order to prevent leakage.

Funnel device formed as in Fig. 2 is shown in position for use in Fig. 3. Rim 4 sufficiently covers the vulvar region to prevent leakage of urine onto the user's body 5 or clothing. Funnel extends downward during use at an angle of approximately 30 to 45 degrees from the horizontal, leading the urine away from the woman's body and preventing inadvertent soiling of body or clothing.

Figure 1 shows the funnel 1 in collapsed form ready to pack for storage and convenient for carrying in a purse or the like. Funnel 1 is stored in the flattened position, walls completely flattened against rim 4. The entire device is preferably wrapped in an inner hygienic and/or antiseptic wrap. The entire wrapped device may also be placed in a plastic or paper wrapper which prevents tearing or soiling of the wrap. Device is conveniently and privately stored in a purse or pocket until needed. If made of disposable material, the entire device may be thrown away along with wraps after a use.

The device can be produced and supplied in a range of sizes for girls and women of different age groups. While this invention has been described in detail with reference to particular embodiments, it should be understood that many modifications and variations would be apparent to those of skill in the art without departure from the scope and spirit of the invention, as defined in the appended claims. These and other objects will be more readily ascertainable to one skilled in the art from a consideration of the following figures, description and exemplary embodiments, with the understanding that the drawings are illustrative only and that changes may be made in the specific construction illustrated and described within the scope of the appended claims.

Claims

1. An apparatus (1) for aiding a woman in urinating in a standing position, characterised in that it is foldable and leakproof and has a flat-design with two layers, which are either natural folded extensions of each other or simply affixed to each other on the sides (6, 7).

2. The apparatus according to claim 1, characterised in that the two* layers are designed with folding lines (9) allowing the apparatus (1)

a. to emerge as a funnel for usage purposes, or

b. to collapse to its original position for compact storage purposes.

3. The apparatus according to claim 1, characterised in that the two flat layers with folding lines (9) allow emergence of a funnel following squeezing from sides (2, 3), where said flat layers form the conical walls of the funnel when squeezed from the sides (2, 3).

4. The apparatus according to claim 1, characterised in that it becomes an emerging funnel from a flat designed bi-layer apparatus, emerging as a conical shaped container with an oval shaped top opening (10) and a smaller bottom opening (11) that is situated toward the front of the cup, the central axis of said bottom opening (11) being inclined at an angle with regard to the central axis of said top opening (10) to point in a forward direction of said funnel (1), which is aimed at conducting the urine towards the smaller bottom opening (11).

5. The apparatus according to claim 1, characterised in that it becomes an emerging funnel to facilitate directional urination by a female, comprising:

a. a flexible, oval shaped funnel rim (4) which comes with a contour that radially extends and ends in an upturned fashion for surrounding and sealing the top opening of the funnel against the vulva region of the user (5), b. a flexible funnel body which has a substantially continuous wall sloped inwardly and towards the front of said funnel body, said funnel body terminating in an orifice; whereby when held in place the rim (4) engages the female's vulvar region and urine passed from the female's urethra is collected in the funnel to flow out the orifice to be conducted away from the body by the tube.

6. The apparatus according to claim 1, characterised in that the side wall of the funnel (1) is convex so as to direct incoming urine downwardly toward the bottom opening (11) in a stabilized flow.

7. The apparatus according to claim 1, characterised in that it is made of paper, paperboard or biodegradable plastics.

8. The apparatus according to claim 1, characterised in that it is made leakproof by coating the whole area forming the inner walls of the funnel with a leakproof however still biodegradable material.

9. The apparatus according to claim 8, characterised in that the leakproof material is polyethylene.

10. A urinating aid package, characterised in that it comprises the apparatus (1) according to one of the preceding claims, which is surrounded by a disposable and biodegradable packaging material.

11. A urinating aid package, characterised in that it comprises the apparatus (1) according to one of the preceding claims, which is surrounded by a reusable and disinfectable packaging material.