Bathroom help - useful aids

As we get older using the bathroom and the various items of furniture within it can become more and more of a problem.

Stepping in and out of a bath, standing for several minutes in a shower, leaning over a wash basin and using a toilet can all be taxing and physically demanding activities.

These same tasks can be a difficult for anyone with a physical disability or anyone who has a large build.

In short, the bathroom can easily become something akin to an obstacle course for someone without the benefit of youth and good health.

Solutions

Despite what may appear to be the bleak picture painted above, a bathroom can easily be made less of a challenge by adding numerous aids and modifications, all of which make its functional furniture easier to use. For further information about these aids continue reading below.

Here are some examples of the bathroom modifications that can be made.

Walk in baths are one of the most useful items for anyone finding the process of getting into a bath a problem. They have a side door that opens to a leave a step over ledge that is only a few inches above the floor level. These baths have to be filled when the bather is in the bath, however they have fast fill and fast drain systems to speed things up.

Chairs, seats, stools, rails and steps are excellent additions to a standard bathroom that need not cost the earth, but that can make a bathroom easier to negotiate. Rails can be positioned at strategic points around the bathroom, inside showers and adjacent to toilets and wash basins, whilst seats can enable showering and washing to be done whilst sat down.

Steps can be an aid in getting into a high base level shower and grab rails can be fixed either side of a toilet and next to a bath.

As well as standard seating, a seat can be a part of another item of bathroom furniture.

Two good examples are lift-seats for toilets, where the seat can be raised or lowered by remote control using an electric motor, and a bath seat. Bath seats (also known as bath lifts) can enable someone to sit down on the seat on the bathroom side of the bath, then swivel so that they are above the bath, before being lowered down into the bath. The reverse motion allows them to leave the bath, and all powered by an electric motor. A cradle device can fulfil the same function.
Cushions along with protective and impact absorbing floor surfaces can all have their place inside a bathroom. All can add comfort, or protect against serious injury in the event of a fall. They also add a sense of security and confidence to the mind of the person using this important room.

For anyone looking at a completely new bathroom fit-out for a mobility restricted person, options can include a shower toilet that provide a hygienic washing system and even body driers that blow jets of warm dry air as a substitute for a towel.

Commodes may be able to offer a solution when it becomes necessary to bring the toilet to the individual and not the other way around. These may sound unpleasant, but modern commodes are hygienic, easy to empty and easy to clean. Some will even double as shower chairs which makes them a practical solution for two different challenges.