Difficult to manoeuvre wheelchairs
by Ana, January 21, 2010 11:30 AM
Having had to "drive" a wheel chair for an old woman for the past few weeks, I have come to hate the thing. First of all after I manage to get the wheelchair past the bathroom's door, I struggle to pull it back out again because the front wheels do not really have enough space to rotate the required 180 degrees. Also it is impossible for the lady to go past the doors by herself because we can just fit the wheelchair but not with her hands on the side turning the wheels. Could someone design a wheelchair people could "drive" without their hands extending the total width of the chair?
Wheelchairs that are hard to manoeuvre are a huge pain in the rear, I quite agree!
If the wheelchair the lady is using is like the one in the picture, it's quite institutional and not really meant for home use. You can get ones that are much more streamlined and (depending on the width of the user) narrower all along. It's also possible to get chairs which are narrower just at the front where the feet go, and have smaller casters at the front so they will turn in a smaller area.
There are various long-term solutions (get the bathroom doorway widened or changed, get offset hinges for the current door, get a sliding door or curtain instead, get a new wheelchair, etc.) if the wheelchair will be a long-term thing, but I hear your pain in the meantime!! If you're looking for useful suggestions leave a message and I'll have a go at that too :)
Cheers,
Jeshyr
PS
One thing that can make a big difference in how easy a chair is to push/manoevure, although it won't solve your space problem, is to get the wheel alignment checked - like you would for a car. You'll need a wheelchair repair place for that, but it's fairly quick and cheap - the people who do mine come to my house to fix the alignment - and can make a real difference to the ease of pushing/steering.
Thank you for your advice, Ricky.
I believe the wheelchair is only a temporary thing (so mush so that we are renting it) so I won't go for the more expensive, permanent options you mentioned. But I quite like your last suggestion of the alignment. I will be looking into that.
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