An unprecedented lockdown and completely new hospitals built in just a few days, who will ever forget the pictures from Wuhan in early 2020? The challenges to master the health crisis included all fields. Due to the short time available to treat patients with severe symptoms of COVID-19 professionally, the criteria to be met by doctors and nurses as well as medical equipment providers and their suppliers were extremely high. This also applied to Beijing Wandong Medical Technology Co. Ltd., a specialist in medical imaging, known worldwide under the Wandong brand name. Owing to their networked and intelligent manufacturing and service processes, the company was able to deliver large product quantities in a short time. With the urgently needed digital mobile X-ray devices, however, it became apparent that additional support on the part of the supplier was necessary regarding the rapid supply of industrial gas springs.
 
Mobile X-ray devices for digital radiography (DR) are crucial technical helpers for physicians since they are not only stable and reliable and their images are as good as those of fixed DR devices. More importantly, they also help medical staff to look into the human body virtually anywhere to make fast decisions about the condition that the lungs of the patients are in. At the same time, they reduce the radiation exposure for patients and staff compared to previous solutions.

ACE confirmed as first choice also for delivery capability

Before the pandemic, and to further increase user safety, Wandong had already been exploring the market for gas springs and tested products from various manufacturers to reduce operating risks when moving the beam arm of the device: Since the medical personnel has to lift the arm supported by the gas springs to a certain control position which can vary each time according to the patient's anatomy, quality and reliability of the mechanical assistants in maintaining the holding force are important during mobile X-ray operation. Already during the test phase, gas springs supplied by ACE came out of the race as first choice. When ACE was able to deliver several hundred units of consistent quality in the shortest possible time, as the health crisis situation in Wuhan was at its peak, Wandong was convinced to have found an equally powerful partner. On behalf of ACE, which is part of the STABILUS Group, Dr. Tian Xuefeng, Managing Director of STABILUS (Jiangsu) Co., Ltd. summarizes the situation on site: "We have made every effort to help and to ensure that our products reach the equipment manufacturers as soon as possible. Faced with the severe epidemic, every minute and every second counted."

The selected ACE pull type GZ-28-450 gas springs have a positive effect on user-friendliness in many respects: They reliably hold the beam arm in the final position, and they support the muscle power during raising and lowering. In doing so, they work in the opposite way to the principle of gas push type springs. This means that the gas pressure in the cylinder draws the piston rod in and, when moving the arm, supports the manual force required for a controlled motion. The gas springs also offer maximum service life thanks to solid chrome-plated piston rods and integrated sliding bearings. With these maintenance-free and ready-to-install components designers can choose between body diameters from 15 mm to 40 mm and traction forces from 40 N to 5,000 N. In Wandong’s mobile X-ray solution models with an outer diameter of 28 mm and a maximum force of 1,200 N at a stroke length of 450 mm work reliably. There is an additional advantage of ACE’s design: No matter what the stroke length, the traction force can be subsequently adjusted via a valve by letting gas escape or by filling it with the filling case available from ACE, depending on the application.

Both at peak times of the crisis in the newly built hospitals in Wuhan and in the calmer clinical routine afterwards, the industrial gas springs have lived up to their reputation as problem solvers. For X-ray staffs they have increased safety and user-friendliness, literally freeing their powers to concentrate on their actual tasks, not only in the uniquely hectic times of this pandemic: Saving lives.