Rubber flooring for bathroom applications is a crucial precautionary step to avoid painful injuries, costly business insurance premiums and medical bills. Are you a business owner who is worried about slippery floors? Public bathrooms are often a site of abuse. If left unattended public facilities can become a liability concern for any business. The same is true for residential facilities. Slippery tiles are so common place that towels and absorbent mats are used to keep floors dry.
Let’s follow the morning bathroom ritual of our hypothetical couple Kurt and Courtney. It’s 5 am and Kurt hops into the shower to freshen up for work. A nice hot shower also serves to wake him up following a long night’s rest. Courtney wakes up just as Kurt finishes his shower and he heads to his dresser to suit up. Dazed from just waking up, Courtney shuffles to the soggy, foggy bathroom – which by now bears resemblance to a steamy sauna – and disrobes to shower. Then, almost instantaneously, she is lying on her back, staring at the bathroom ceiling with a sharp pain in her neck. The damp bath rug slid under Courtney’s weight and unexpectedly sent her to the hard bathroom floor. Simple and very affordable bathroom rubber mats would have averted this mess!
A recent report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recorded approximately 234,000 nonfatal bathroom injuries among people ages 15 and above in 2008 (CDC). About 80 percent of these bathroom injuries were caused by slips and falls, like the one poor imaginary Courtney suffered. That is 234,000 injuries, not a small number!
In light of these startling statistics, laying down bathroom rubber mats is a simple, easy, and affordable way to avoid slipping and falling in your bathroom. Our bathroom mats are made of rubber, a material which naturally provides exceptional slip-resistance and traction. Rubber’s high coefficient of friction prevents slips and falls even in moist or wet conditions like a steamy bathroom. Rubber is not affected by moisture and neither will moisture affect its performance.
“[People] need to use slip-resistant mats in and outside of bathtubs to prevent slips and falls,” recommends Dr. Gary A. Smith, director of the Center for Injury Research and Policy at the Research Institute at Nationwide Children's Hospital in Columbus, Ohio.
For those with children, the necessity for bathroom rubber mats is greater. Dr. Smith published a study in 2009 revealing that there are about 43,000 bathroom-related injuries to children under the age of 18 (ABC News). The study also showed that 48 percent of the injuries were inflicted to the child’s face and 15 percent to the head and neck. Considering the fragility of a younger child, the percentages of these injury areas is alarming.
It can’t be stressed enough that rubber flooring for bathroom applications is the best option to deter bathroom slips and falls. Using rubber bathroom mats provide traction in even the wettest conditions and will save you and your loved ones from pain and injury.