Portable Chair Lifts: Mobility and Standing Autonomy
Alongside technology that helps keep us alive longer are technologies that help us enjoy our longer lives. One important aspect of day-to-day living is mobility.
Whether you’re someone who lives with arthritis, someone who’s recovering from surgery, or someone enjoying a long lifespan, you might sometimes have an issue getting up from sitting. Some people affected by mobility issues can sit up from lying down, and even still walk, but have trouble getting up onto their feet. For those times, a portable chair lift can prove invaluable to keeping your standing autonomy.
A portable chair lift is a device made of a cushion under which a mechanism slowly lifts one end to an angle.
If you think of hospital beds where one end can be cranked to sit a person up, most portable chair lifts work on the same principles. Some of these devices work using electricity to power the mechanisms inside. The advantage of electric chair lifts is that they give you greater control over movement, as they come with handheld control devices that let you press a button to start lifting the seat and just as easily press a button to stop.
The hassle of needing to charge the batteries or needing to find a nearby power outlet could mean a portable chair lift that’s powered purely by mechanical force would be a better solution.
In this case, the chair lifts usually work by having a mechanism underneath that constantly applies a light upward force on the seat, sometimes with a simple spring, but for safety’s sake usually with pressurized gas that applies the force slowly. When the user sits down on the tilted cushion, their body weight is enough to overcome this force and pushes the cushion flat. When the user tries to sit up however, this same pneumatic force greatly reduces the effort needed.
In the same vein, portable chair assist devices also come in forms similar to crutches. With these types, a wide base made of metal tubes that curve horizontally is designed to distribute a person’s weight onto the ground with rubber tips to prevent sliding. Then the vertical parts are several tiers of bars with rubber foam padding that act as handles that can help a person with mobility issues lever themselves out of chairs.
For caregivers of those with mobility issues who only need a little bit of help, portable chair assist handles can also be used. These are essentially the same technology used by gym equipment to help the user keep grip, which is a metal tube covered with rubber foam padding. In portable assist handles, these are essentially two sets of handles on either side of a loop of metal, one for the caregiver and one for the person with mobility issues. While simple, these allow both people to need less grip strength due to the horizontal positioning of their hands as opposed to hand-to-hand grip positions.
All in all, these various types of portable chair lifts mean that mobility issues don’t need to be the end being able to stand on your own.
