Two manufacturers of adult portable bed rails announced separate recalls this week of devices linked to four deaths of elderly Americans.   

Nearly 105,000 Carex brand rails sold from 2012 to December 2021 are being recalled after three entrapment deaths, the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission and medical equipment supplier Compass Health Brands announced on Wednesday. 

The company learned of three fatalities related to one of two models being recalled: an 85-year-old man at an assisted living facility in Ohio, an 84-year-old woman at her home in California and an 88-year-old woman at an assisted living facility in Washington. The deaths occurred between April 2014 and June 2020, and in each case the user became trapped between the device and their mattress. 

The deaths involved Carex brand Bed Support Rails (model P566). Consumers should stop using and contact the company for a repair kit to more securely attach the product to a bed. 

The company is also recalling Carex brand Easy Up 2-in-1 Bed Rails (model P569) and offering a refund. 

The recalled bed rails cost between $22 and $80 and were sold by retailers including Amazon and Walmart. Consumers can call Compass at (888) 571-2710 from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Eastern time, Monday through Friday, or see the company’s website for more information on the recall. 

A separate recall also announced Wednesday involves 272,000 Endurance Hand Bed Rails distributed by Essential Medical Supply. The recall cited the 2012 entrapment death of an 86-year-old man at his home in California. 

The rails sold for between $36 and $98 from October 2006 through December 2021 at medical supply stores nationwide and online at Amazon and Walmart. 

Consumers were urged to stop using the recalled bed rails, which include four models with the following numbers: P1410, P1410-P, P1411 and P1411-P. 

Consumers can contact Essential Medical Supply at (888) 856-011 during business hours for more information about obtaining a possible refund or consult the company’s website for more information.

The two recalls follow a third recall earlier this month of nearly 500,000 bed rails sold nationwide following two separate reports of asphyxiation deaths involving adult users who became trapped between their bed rails and mattresses.

The CPSC in April warned Americans of the strangulation risks of three models of portable bedrails linked to the deaths of four elderly or disabled individuals. The agency’s alert involved rails recalled six years earlier and then sold with safety straps thought to address the danger. 

Often purchased for sick or frail older people, the side rails or metal bars are also widely used on hospital beds and in home care with the idea of helping patients pull themselves up or to keep them from falling out of bed. But the products — which are marketed as safety devices — have shown to be anything but for the thousands of older and disabled patients injured by them, sometimes fatally. 

An estimated 69,000 adults were treated in U.S. hospital emergency rooms for rail-related injuries from 2003 to 2019, according to the CPSC. Among those incidents, 260 cases involved adult portable bed rails, including 247 fatalities, according to a July 2020 CPSC briefing paper.

The CPSC in June unveiled new safety standards to effectively ban inclined sleepers for babies under age five months after the products were linked to numerous infant deaths from asphyxiation. The agency’s standard for adult bed rails, however, remains voluntary. 

“The question of whether the current products available on the market in 2020 substantially comply with the voluntary standard has yet to be determined,” added the agency in the report, which estimates that between 90,000 and 425,000 adult portable bedrails are sold annually.

Portable rails may be regulated either by the Food and Drug Administration as a medical product or by the CPSC as a consumer product, depending on the intended use. 

The agencies “have received many death and injury reports related to both adult portable bed rail products and hospital bed rails,” the FDA states on its website. Most involve entrapment and falls, with deaths and serious injuries possible even when the products are properly designed, compatible with the bed and mattress, and used appropriately, the agency said.

The trouble is likely understated as bed rails are not necessarily listed as the cause of death by nursing homes and coroners, or as the cause of injury by emergency room doctors. 

“They are all unsafe. Whether it’s a bed rail placed on the side of a bed to protect an adult or a child from falling out of the bed, or to help them position themselves, to help get in and out of bed, they are too dangerous,” Dr. Michael Carome, director of health research at Public Citizen, told CBS MoneyWatch in July. “There is no way to design them to make them safe because entrapment can occur.”