Delivering to Hawai‘i

Dolphin FIS Therapy Surfaces in Hawai‘i

A Dolphin FIS system reaches Hawai‘i the way everything else does: in a container, on a ship, out of a West Coast port, into Honolulu Harbour. That leg is well-run and predictable, and it is the leg almost every mainland supplier quotes. If you live on O‘ahu, that quote is the whole story. If you live anywhere else in the state, it is roughly half of it, because after Honolulu there is a second freight leg on an interisland barge, with its own sailing schedule and its own cost, and a family in Hilo or Līhu‘e should not be finding that out after they have committed.

So this page quotes the second leg. Kahului for Maui, Hilo or Kawaihae for Hawai‘i Island, Nāwiliwili for Kaua‘i, Kaunakakai for Moloka‘i, Kaumalapa‘u for Lāna‘i — each on a published schedule, typically weekly to each port. Missing a sailing does not cost you an afternoon, it costs you until the next one. That is the number that should shape a discharge plan here, and it is the number we will give you before you order. Dolphin FIS and Fluid Immersion Simulation are registered trademarks of Joerns Healthcare LLC; we are an authorized dealer and we are not Joerns.

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The second leg: island harbour freight

Coming home from

A tertiary hospital on O‘ahu

Specialty and complex care in this state is concentrated in Honolulu. Neighbor-island residents are routinely flown over for it and flown home afterwards, so the treating hospital and the delivery address are frequently on different islands.
A regional hospital on a neighbor island

Maui, Hawai‘i Island and Kaua‘i each have hospital services that handle a wide range of care and transfer what they cannot. A discharge from one of them still means a delivery that crossed two oceans legs to get there.
A critical access hospital on a small island

Moloka‘i and Lāna‘i are served by very small facilities. Anything more involved means a flight, which makes home equipment on those islands a more consequential decision than it is elsewhere.
A private home in a coastal or windward community

Easy access, level living, and the highest ambient humidity of anywhere we deliver — which is the one environmental specification worth checking here.
A rural home on Hawai‘i Island or Kaua‘i

Puna, Ka‘ū, Hāmākua and the Kaua‘i west side include subdivisions on unpaved roads and homes on catchment water and solar. The final few miles are the part to describe to us in advance.

Going home to Hawai‘i

Plan around the sailing. The mainland-to-Honolulu leg is the reliable part; the interisland leg is the one with a weekly rhythm, and the practical consequence is that a delivery date here is a sailing date plus a short road leg, not a transit estimate. If a discharge is being planned for a neighbor island, tell us the island and the town at the start, because that determines which port, which sailing and therefore which week. Under federal law, cargo moving between two United States ports travels on United States-flagged vessels, which is a large part of why ocean freight to and within this state costs and schedules the way it does. It is not a surcharge anyone invented and it is not something we can route around.

One thing we ask everyone here to do before anything is booked: measure the bed frame and send us the numbers. Joerns states that the equipment is not to be used where gaps of even a few inches are left between the mattress and the head panel, foot panel or side rails. On the mainland, a width that turns out wrong is an exchange. Here it is another container, another sailing and another week or more, for a patient who needed the surface when it was first ordered. The measurement takes ten minutes and it is the single highest-value thing a family in this state can do before ordering.

Homes here, and what fits in them

Hawaiian houses are generally kind to a delivery and occasionally awkward in a specific way. Single-storey living, carports rather than garages, and wide openings in newer construction all help. Plantation-era homes are the exception: single-wall construction, narrow interior doors, and a set of exterior steps up to a raised post-and-pier floor, with no handrail on the side you want to carry from. The standard surface is 35 inches wide and 82 inches long, and 82 inches is what to check against the turn at the top of those steps rather than the width of the door.

Humidity is the environmental figure that matters here, and it is the mirror image of the Texas problem. Temperature is a non-issue: Joerns states an operating range of 50 to 95 degrees Fahrenheit, and Hawaiian rooms simply live inside it. Relative humidity is the live one. The stated operating range is 30 to 75 percent, non-condensing, and a windward or coastal room with the louvres open sits above 75 percent for long stretches of the year. That does not make the equipment unusable, and we are not going to dress it up as a crisis — it makes the choice of room worth a thought, and it makes a dehumidifier or an air-conditioned room a reasonable thing to raise with the care team rather than an extravagance. If the only available room is an open windward bedroom, tell us and we will give you the manufacturer’s figures plainly rather than wave it away.

Good to know in Hawai‘i

The second leg is the leg that gets left out: Honolulu is not Hawai‘i. Getting a system to Kahului, Hilo, Kawaihae, Nāwiliwili, Kaunakakai or Kaumalapa‘u is a separate interisland barge movement with its own schedule and its own cost. We quote it with the order. A quote that stops at Honolulu is a quote with a hole in it.
A wrong measurement costs a sailing, not an afternoon: Joerns states the equipment is not to be used where gaps of even a few inches are left at the head panel, foot panel or rails. On the mainland a width error is an exchange; here it is another crossing. Measure the frame before you order, not after the container is loaded.
Thirty to 75 percent humidity, non-condensing: This is the only region we serve where the manufacturer’s humidity ceiling is a live question and the temperature range is not. A windward room with the windows open can sit above 75 percent. It is worth choosing the room, and discussing ventilation or dehumidification, rather than discovering the specification afterwards.
Each island grid stands alone: There is no interisland transmission here: an outage on Hawai‘i Island cannot be backstopped from O‘ahu. Joerns states the battery back-up supplies the control unit for approximately twelve hours when power fails, and recharges once it returns. That is a useful margin on an island grid and it is not a substitute for knowing what the fallback is.

Communities we deliver to

Honolulu and urban O‘ahu · Windward O‘ahu and Kāne‘ohe · The Leeward Coast and ‘Ewa · Central O‘ahu and Mililani · The North Shore · Kahului and Wailuku · Kīhei and South Maui · West Maui · Upcountry Maui and Kula · Hāna · Hilo and East Hawai‘i · Kailua-Kona and the Kona Coast · Waimea and the Hāmākua Coast · Puna and Ka‘ū · Līhu‘e and East Kaua‘i · Kapa‘a and the North Shore of Kaua‘i · Waimea and West Kaua‘i · Kaunakakai, Moloka‘i · Lāna‘i City

Most requested in Hawai‘i

Standard Dolphin FIS Mattress

At 35 inches wide it is the configuration that clears the narrow interior doors of single-wall plantation-era homes, and it matches the deck of most homecare frames already in island bedrooms.

$X,XXX–$Y,YYY/mo

Wide 42-Inch Dolphin FIS Mattress

The 42-inch wide surface, rated at the same 500 lb as the 35-inch. Where a wider surface is right, the width has to be settled before the container is loaded — a correction here is another sailing, not an exchange.

$X,XXX–$Y,YYY/mo

Dolphin Wheelchair & Stretcher Seating Pads

A neighbor-island resident attending a specialist appointment on O‘ahu spends most of a day seated — in a car, at an airport, on a flight and back again. The seated surfaces cover the hours the bed does not.

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Discharge coming up

Coming home from hospital in the next day or two?

Send us a note with the discharge date and the surface the care team has recommended, whether the patient is leaving a hospital, a rehabilitation facility, a skilled nursing facility or hospice care. What can arrive in time depends on stock, the freight lane and the hour you call, so the earlier the better.

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Nearby areas we deliver to

West Coast Alaska All areas →

Equipment rentals in Hawai‘i: questions

We are on Maui, not O‘ahu. Does that change the price and the timing?

Yes, and we will tell you by how much before you order. The mainland leg brings the system into Honolulu. From there, reaching Kahului is a separate interisland barge movement with its own published sailing schedule, typically weekly, and its own cost. Most mainland suppliers quote you to Honolulu and stop. We quote both legs together, because the second one is the one that decides which week the surface actually arrives.

Why is ocean freight here so expensive?

Largely because of federal law: cargo moving between two United States ports has to travel on United States-flagged vessels. That applies to everything shipped from the mainland to Hawai‘i and between the islands, and it is not something a supplier can route around. We would rather explain it than bury it in a line item, and rather than pretend our freight is somehow exempt.

How humid is too humid for this equipment?

Joerns states operating conditions of 30 to 75 percent relative humidity, non-condensing, alongside 50 to 95 degrees Fahrenheit. Temperature is never the issue here. Humidity can be: a windward or coastal room with the louvres open will sit above 75 percent for long stretches. That is worth factoring into which room the bed goes in, and worth raising with the care team if a dehumidifier or air conditioning is an option. We will give you the manufacturer’s figures rather than an opinion.

What if the mattress turns out to be the wrong size for the bed?

That is the mistake this state punishes hardest, which is why we ask for the frame measurements before anything is booked. Joerns states the equipment is not to be used where gaps of even a few inches are left between the mattress and the head panel, foot panel or rails, so a mismatch is a clinical problem and not just an inconvenience. Correcting it from here means another crossing and another sailing. Ten minutes with a tape measure in advance is the best-value thing you can do.

We are in a Puna subdivision on an unpaved road. Can delivery reach us?

Usually, but describe the last mile to us at the time of booking rather than leaving it to the driver. What matters is whether a truck can reach and turn at the property, whether the road condition changes in heavy rain, and whether the house is on catchment and solar, because that affects the power conversation as well as the access one. These are all solvable in advance and expensive to solve on the day.

What happens at the end of a rental on a neighbor island?

The same two legs in reverse, on the same sailing schedule. We quote the return at the start rather than at the end. A collection here is arranged around the barge rather than around the day the equipment is finished with, and it is better for everyone if that is understood from the beginning.

Book a rental delivered to Hawai‘i

Tell us the address, the date and what the care team recommended. We confirm stock, the monthly rate and a delivery window by phone.

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