There is constant medical research being conducted into the question of making mobility for people with disabilities easier and more effortless. Handicap lifting devices are constantly updated so that the people who take care of those with limited mobility have to exert less energy in lifting and moving them and assistive devices are constantly being invented to make moving under one’s own power easier.
There have been many examples of mobility devices for elderly that have been invented, in a way, by adapting previously existing devices to a new need, in the past decade. Two such devices are the rollator walker or the rollator and the rolling cane. Both these devices have very similar stories which are why we will be talking about them. The rollator is a walker which has had two of its feet replaced with small wheels. Rolling canes also started their life in this way. They were adapted from standing canes or quad canes, as they are sometimes called and the same thing was done to invent them. Two of the feet of a quad cane were substituted with small wheels. With both these new assistive devices, the advantages are similar.
Instead of having to lift up the cane or the walker, with wheels at the bottom you can simply slide the device along the ground. This is a huge energy saver when you are walking, especially for someone who is old or weak in the first place. If you are walking with a regular walker or a standing cane, the repeated lifting and placing of the walker or cane can be tiring to the neck and the arms and it also slows you down. Walkers also have to be made as light as possible so that an old person can lift them easily and repeatedly without too much trouble. This raises a concern about their strength, especially in bariatric usage where they may have to support the weight of a person that weighs more than three hundred pounds.
Related posts: