Product Category
A parent grouping for interchangeable equipment types, such as Wheelchairs containing standard, bariatric, transport, and power wheelchair products.
A product category is the broad family an equipment type belongs to. In a DME catalog, Wheelchairs is a category, while Standard wheelchair, Bariatric wheelchair, Transport wheelchair, and Power wheelchair are separate products within it. Each physical, barcoded wheelchair is then an individual unit of one of those products.
The useful dividing line is operational interchangeability. Equipment should be separate products when purpose, rental price, power type, weight capacity, configuration, or customer expectations mean one item cannot simply replace another. Brand and model only need to define a product when those details materially affect how the item is rented or used.
This category, product, and unit hierarchy keeps a catalog understandable without flattening genuinely different equipment into one inventory count. It also supports category-level reporting while preserving accurate availability and rental history for each product and unit.
How TrackDME addresses this
Manage product categories in TrackDME