Here are seven quick tips that will help you when you are shopping for the best home stair lift for your family. Use this information to help you better understand the industry and how the lifts are made. AC units are the most dependable available. Most offer both AC and DC (battery) but you'll be changing batteries every 18-24 months and they only carry a 6 month warranty. Don't consider a battery operated chair unless you live in an area with frequent brown-outs. Mark your calendar every 18 months to remind you to automatically replace the batteries if you choose to buy a battery operated lift. Batteries don't last forever. Look for lifts that have a swiveling seat at 45 and 90 degrees both at the top and bottom. And make sure you install a vertically mounted bar at the top and bottom of the run in case the rider becomes unstable when getting up. Be mindful to buy a lift that uses only a rocker switch to operate and not a toggle or joy switch which could get snagged in clothing. Remotes tend to get lost. Stair lifts shouldn't contain circuit boards. They don't hold up when the lift is being used and moved up and down. Repair can be a very expensive service call. Make sure your home lift has at least a 5 year warranty on everything. If a company can't stand behind their product why would you want to buy it? Think about it. Stair lifts don't see that much action. All a warranty is really doing is covering the motor and moving parts. But make sure everything is covered, even the rail on your residential stair lift. Finally, your stair lift needs to have what is called a call-send unit. This is something that can send the chair up or down stairs when you need it there, without you on it. This will help you get the chair out of sight when you have visitors and will free up space when not in use. It's a good feature that shouldn't be extra.

Home Elevaotrs in Great Barrington MA

Tips for Living Alone After Head Injury With Hemiparesis and Avoiding Falls and Injuries Hemiparesis Living is difficult even when you have close family support or caretaker close by. However as we who have been injured in some way, or previously experienced head injury brain damage resulting in hemiparesis, as we age, or children grow up, spouses may move apart find ourselves living alone. The detrimental effects of hemiparesis do not go away and with aging even exhibit stronger effects where the need for safety and extra care by one self is increased. Myself. I was shot in the head in my early twenties followed by a coma and much rehabilitation in trauma unit and hospital. I was fortunate to be able to study engineering earning my degree, but most of the two decades that followed have had me dealing with implications of living with hemiparesis and to be honest as an engineer, found myself analyzing issues that came about and finding or developing best practices or methods. I hope these insights can be used or adapted to help others going through life after head injury or hemiparesis. Safety Risks and Minimizing Starting with safety. in general I can tell you that for myself and many spoken with in person or in online groups too, the worse effects that occur are when the body is tired. A close second is in the cold, freezing temperatures and inclement weather as snow sleet, etc. By tired I say early in morning or especially late in the day. Arising in the night for whatever reason, can find legs extra wobbly and rather easy to lose one's balance. Having halls where light can go on easily, possibly a motion detector switch and uncluttered walkways are a couple basics that can help prevent a sudden slip or poor footing. This can really prevent serious further injury. Trust me, one shoe or slipper on a dark walkway can turn out to be a violent fall. It doesn't necessarily have to be a poor balance issue. Sometimes the weaker foot from say for example left hemiparesis or right hemiparesis will turn sideways and instead of landing on flat bottom part of foot., will actually land on the side of foot even at an angle sometimes. This can cause a quick fall and when this happens, a first reaction is to use the strong hand to grab onto something to catch balance. If there isn't anything on the strong side, then a fall is really likely or partial fall likely. Keep this in mind when keeping the hall and bath safe. Railings are great, but easy to grab handles, even small ledges can help give a person's balance back. They have suction cup handles, lights that can be added economically for safety. Check a local large hardware store as Lowes. Besides having something available on good side, simply walking slower, smaller steps will help. Walking in socks alone on some surfaces can be like walking on ice to a person with hemiparesis. For example. I can walk OK on most carpets that are wall to wall but when I approach tile or ceramic flooring or a throw rug, slow way down for safety. A common issue in people with either left hemiparesis or right hemiparesis is tripping forward when their weaker toe drags and often is close enough to floor to catch it on a carpet or even have the toes roll over. Not having proper control of these toes will look to others as not picking up the foot enough. This effect can happen so fast and somewhat unpredictable. However, going back to the first premise, this will occur more often when the body is tired or weakened in some way possibly even from extreme weather changes. It is obviously more of a possibility when walking faster. Walking faster increases the risk. Note that there are items available in stores or online to adhere throw rugs to the floors surface. This simple action can be a life saver. Regarding Assistive Devices Some therapists and caretakers recommend canes either a quad cane or straight cane but I can tell you after a couple decades with hemiparesis, canes do not always work, they can actually give you a false sense of security causing people to move faster but not able to protect oneself in an accident. Most of the time almost always it's the weak side that has the foot dragging or catching on something, maybe a rug or object or just twisting so that it lands on the side. And what happens next is either I would fall straight ahead and to the left very fast or tip sideways again to the left. I am using left here as the weaker side or left hemiparesis. Now the cane would be in the stronger hand, on the right side in this case and is not much help on the left. The left arm in many of left hemiparesis wont do much good either as it is too weak to prevent the fall and probably too slow to do anything in time If a walker is recommended and one can be modified to use with one weakened side, then use it. Of course, you'll want to learn to walk without it but for some it's best to keep using. Check with your own health professional. In the early days after a head injury or accident, wheelchairs are commonly use and effectively safe. Myself, I've used one after the coma for almost two years before graduating to a quad cane and then later using just he regular cane and now years later without the cane during the warmer months. This last point is important with regards to wheel chairs. I had lived in the snow belt up in the Northeast when I was first injured and the use of the wheelchair was indeed a life saver with the snow and ice. It is not feasible for most to leave their home areas but if at all possible as people with hemiparesis age, a move to the southern climate or even out west is well advised. Living with hemiparesis and living alone can be safer in the warmer climates, free of ice and snow. That may be obvious for walking but there are other benefits as well. The sunshine daily may even help your thinking and overall attitude positively, Sure you may still get a month or two of weather where it reaches freezing but it does not stay there for long. Aches and Pains can virtually disappear. People's old injuries are often painful in cold moist weather. This is not different for head injuries, but in this case it may very be the brain that suffers pain. It is also the control center for emotions and that too can be better in the warmer climate. Lessons learned.

Stair Lift for Chairs in Great Barrington MA

The stair climber is a well-liked health machine that lets you mimic the motion of climbing stairs, as the identify suggests. Stairlift Company Opinions can even assist you choose the very best stairlift on your wants, as well as help you discover pre-qualified stairlift sellers in your area. Renting a stairlift could also be the preferred choice for brief or long term rent, for customers who don't want the worry and additional expense of maintenance and servicing prices of a stairlift. The observe is mounted on the stair treads and can extend out from the wall between 6 to 9 inches. The chairlift's seat, arms, and footrest will fold up when the elevate isn't in use. Stairlift monitor does lengthen past the bottom of the staircase which, in some cases, is usually a problem. According to Harvard Health Publications, a one hundred fifty five-pound individual will burn about 260 energy using a stationary bike at a reasonable intensity for 30 minutes, whereas that same individual would burn solely 223 calories utilizing a stair climber for 30 minutes. Should you're the lone wolf kind who prefers to work out on your own, then you can go ahead and select both the bike or the stair climber. As soon as you've got decided which type of exercise machine is better for you, it is time to get to work. The American School of Sports activities Drugs recommends getting a total of at the least 150 minutes of exercise per week. You will want to know the variety of steps and the nature of the touchdown on the high of your stairs and at the backside. If your staircase has several steps to a landing and then angles right or left to extra steps, your answer is much like the straight staircase however you will want more than one. A number of stair lifts may be installed in tandem and supply a very good resolution to your state of affairs. A curved stairlift may be a chance however requires a custom design and normally is value prohibitive ($20,000 or more). The government adds fees onto stair raise registration or licensing and will require an installer to have a specific license. Finding out that stair lift prices may be a bit too excessive so that you can afford the set up of one could be much more devastating. Many individuals who do not need the preliminary funding to buy a stair raise and then have it put in will look into beating stair elevate costs by looking into financing choices. With a leap rope you can enhance the depth of your workout just by skipping earlier than or after your stair climbs. I have used dumbbells to increase resistance in my lunge exercises and I've also accomplished climbs with 40 pound dumbbells in each hand simply to strive one thing new. He advised his son that climbing stairs with sand-crammed buckets is a real check of anyone's strength. I've used weighted vests for nearly anything that you are able to do in stair climbing. Needless to say its lifting capability is 306 lbs - mixed chair and user weight.