The present patent application relates to a hygienic pad for water closet (WC) seats of public baths.

The advantages of the invention shall become evident after a short description of the prior art.

As it is known, users are quite reluctant to seat on water closet seats in public baths, fearing they can come in contact with dirt, liquids or germs of different kinds.

The problem of making the contact with water seats safe and hygienic has been discussed for a long time.

In particular, disposable paper pads are available on the market, whose profile basically reflects the annular shape of traditional water seats.

On one hand, paper pads can theoretically insulate the user's skin from the seat; on the other hand, in practical terms, they provide rather precarious protection.

The reason is that, first of all, paper is a completely permeable material and absorbs liquids. Additionally, paper pads are very unstable, since they are simply laid on the seat and they easily lose their position, exposing the user's skin to contact with the seat surface.

The attempts made by manufacturers to make the position of paper pads stable with strings or rubber bands have not been successful, due to their intrinsic inefficiency and difficulties and costs encountered during production.

Another inconvenience of paper pads is that users of public baths tend to dispose them directly in the WC, causing inevitable damages to the drain and sewage system.

The purpose of the invention is to obtain an hygienic pad with simple, cost-effective structure, capable of ensuring excellent protection for the user.

Obviously, the hygienic pad of the invention has an annular shape

similar to traditional WC seats. Unlike existing paper pads, it guarantees stable adhesion to the water seat, is impermeable, comfortable, non- deformable and thermally insulated.

The new pad is obtained from a thin sheet of an intrinsically impermeable, flexible and mouldable material.

The object of the invention may be obtained from plastic materials (such as polyethylene, polystyrene, polypropylene or foam silicone), rubber materials (polyurethane or neoprene), plastic foam or rubber foam.

A closed-cell foam polymeric material must be preferably used, since it is impermeable and provides excellent protection against liquid penetration.

Alternatively, an open-cell foam polymeric material coated with a thin layer of impermeable material can be used.

In any case, the material must preferably be an anti-slip material, to prevent the pad from losing its correct position on the smooth surface of the WC seat because of the user's weight.

To additionally stabilise the position of the hygienic pad, the lower side of the pad is provided with adhesive inserts that hold the pad to the water closet seat when the user is sitting on it and can be easily removed with simple traction.

The adhesive inserts are protected with suitable strips that can be removed before use and can consist in bi-adhesive labels or glue.

The hygienic pad of the invention can alternatively be provided with strings or laces to provide stable connection with the WC seat.

The presence of fixing means and the thermal insulation properties are extremely advantageous when using the hygienic pad on public water closets without seat.

As regards the construction technique, the hygienic pad can be obtained with die cutting, cutting, hot forming, injection moulding or casting.

In an embodiment with lower thickness, the hygienic pad of the invention is characterised by great deformability and compliance and can be folded repeatedly and eventually packed in pocket-size envelopes (particularly suitable for travellers).

It is worthless saying that such an embodiment is quite inexpensive and therefore particularly suitable for disposable use.

In an embodiment with higher thickness, apart from guaranteeing increased comfort, the hygienic pad of the invention can be repeatedly used by the same user.

Such an embodiment is, for example, particularly suitable for use in hotel rooms. When spending several nights in the same room, hotel guests can cover the WC seat with the hygienic pad and use it without changing it until their departure.

For major clarity the description of the invention continues with reference to the enclosed drawings, which are intended for purposes of illustration and not in a limiting sense, whereby: - Fig. 1 is a perspective view of the hygienic pad of the invention on the WC seat; - Fig. 2 is cross-section view of a particular embodiment of the same hygienic pad.

With reference to Fig. 1, the object of the invention consists in an annular pad (1) obtained with a thin layer of impermeable soft flexible plastic or rubber materials.

The profile of the pad (1) must be perfectly compatible with the seat on which it is used.

In particular, the embodiment shown in Fig. 1 has a basically annular profile with basically rectilinear back section, since it is designed for use on traditional WC seats with such a profile.

It is understood that, within the scope of the present invention, the pad (1) can have an annular profile compatible with any other model of WC seats available on the market.

As shown in Fig. 2, the lower side of pad (1) is provided with adhesive inserts (2) covered with tear-off paper strips (3), which ensure the stable adhesion of the pad (1) on the WC seat.

Figure 2 refers to a special constructive version of the invention according to which the pad (1) is made of impermeable foam polymer and

coated with a thin glossy polyethylene sheet (4) on the upper side.

In this case the spongy lower side guarantees safe grip both on the smooth surface of the seat and on the WC without seat, while the function of the glossy polyethylene layer (4) is to prevent the pad (1) from adhering and sticking to the user's skin.