25 January 2018

The FP3 Birth Pool is designed from the ground up to be fit for purpose: to be the best birth pool available. Every aspect of its design and manufacture has been carefully chosen with the goals of safety, availability, comfort & convenience in mind. In this article we will focus on the choice of materials and structure of the pool.

The pool surface material is Lucite (™) acrylic. Lucite has a high hardness and low porosity. This means it is resistant to scratching and staining. If the surface is damaged, then it is easily returned to its original finish by sanding and buffing the affected area – this can be done without removal of the pool and with standard tools by the hospital’s maintenance team, resulting in minimal loss of availability. The smooth surface and low porosity facilitates thorough cleaning and decontamination with separate or combined detergent and chlorine based sterilisation agents.

The pool structure is created through the following steps:

• Two sheets of Lucite are vacuum-formed into the inner and outer shape of the custom-designed FP3 pool. These are called “shells”.
• The underside of each shell – that side not facing outwards – is then reinforced with a strengthening layer of glass fibre.
• The two shells are then placed together and an adhesive putty is injected between the shells to bond them together and provide additional stiffness.
• After the putty has dried, the edges of the pool are trimmed and hole for drain is drilled.

This creates a birth pool with a high degree of rigidity and capable of supporting a 136kg person sitting on the rim.

The Material Safety Data Sheet (“MSDS”) for Lucite (™) can be downloaded here.

Find out more and download product information on the Edel Immersys FP3 BirthPool at https://www.edelimmersys.com/fp3-birth-pool/