Want your home to be safer for elderly relatives?
Millions of families don’t even consider home safety until after an accident has already occurred. And that’s never the ideal time to be making these decisions.
The good news? With a few key adaptations, your home could be made safer, more comfortable and truly supportive — without having to move into a care home or spend thousands of pounds unnecessarily.
Read on to find out how.
What You’ll Learn…
- Why home design is more important than most people realise
- Everything you need to know about supportive seating for elderly relatives
- How elderly relatives can move easily and safely around your home
- The bathroom adaptations that will reduce risk and increase comfort
- Lighting, flooring and those final tweaks that make your home safer
Dive Right In…
Why Home Design is More Important Than Most People Realise…
Statistics from the NHS reveal that 1 in 3 people aged 65 or over will experience a fall each year — that increases to 1 in 2 for people over the age of 80. Not comforting figures.
The impact of those falls is serious too. They’re estimated to cost the NHS over £2.3 billion every year with over a quarter of a million hospital admissions across the over-65s each year. And the majority of these accidents take place in the home.
But here’s the thing…
They don’t have to happen. Most falls are down to poor environment layout and a lack of supportive furniture. Crucial design choices — both large and small — can vastly reduce the risk of injury to your elderly relatives and allow them to live independently for longer.
And that’s what this guide covers.
Everything You Need To Know About Supportive Seating for Elderly Relatives…
Choosing the right chairs for elderly relatives isn’t just important, it’s essential.
And yet it’s often one of the first things people overlook.
Seating doesn’t seem like it’d be a big deal. But the wrong chair or sofa can massively impact day-to-day life for elderly relatives. Low seats, soft cushions and poorly built frames without armrests all make sitting down and standing up much harder. Compromising safety and placing unnecessary strain on already painful joints.
What should you look for in supportive seating for elderly relatives?
- A higher seat height — standing up and sitting down becomes easier
- Cushions that are firm without losing comfort
- Solid arm rests to assist with standing up
- A stable seating base — no rocking or tipping
- Support for the back to assist posture over long periods
Investing in specialist elder homecare furniture is one of the best homecare investments you can make. Chairs specifically designed for elderly users take all of the points above into consideration. They aren’t your typical sofas and chairs given a senior label.
Powered rise and recline chairs are also worth looking into. Using a motor to gently lift and tilt the seat forward they make sitting down and standing up much easier for elderly relatives with limited mobility or achy joints.
Not a bad starting point eh?
Moving Around Safely…
Getting the seating sorted, it’s time to think about how your elderly relatives will move from room to room.
One of the biggest fall risk areas in the home.
Grab rails and hand rails should be fitted wherever possible. Deployed throughout the home — especially along staircases, hallways and beside doorways — they provide something for your loved ones to grab onto if they lose balance.
Stairlifts can be useful if you have multiple floors. They make going upstairs optional. Particularly useful if your loved one struggles with stairs. Cheaper than you might think too. Plus they can be hired not just bought.
A couple of other changes you can make:
- Get rid of throw rugs/matting — trip hazards don’t just apply to things on the floor
- Keep walkways clear of clutter
- Widening doorways to accommodate walkers/wheelchairs if necessary
- Consider furniture placement to help create natural walkways through the home
Ideally you want your elderly relatives to have a clear, obvious path through the house at all times.
Bathroom Adaptations That’ll Make Your Life Easier…
The bathroom is often home to the highest concentration of risks in the household.
Baths, showers and slippery surfaces. Combine this with the physical effort required to get in and out of baths and you’ve got one of the biggest fall risk areas in the home. Here’s how to fix that.
Walk-in showers are generally much easier than a traditional bathtub. Firstly they remove the need for your loved ones to climb over the side of a bath. A difficult movement for many people every day. Add a shower seat they can fold away when not in use and a hand shower and you’ve got a much more accessible bathroom.
Grab rails beside the toilet and by the shower should be treated as mandatory. Securely fitted into the wall studs for maximum strength.
Equally a raised toilet seat helps with leveraging yourself safely into and out of a toilet. Much like the benefits of supportive seating for elderly users. Throw in some non-slip bath mats and you’ve got everything covered.
Lighting, Flooring and Those Last Few Tweaks…
Here’s a home safety tip that often gets overlooked…
Lighting — or a lack thereof. We all walk into rooms and forget things half the time. Imagine that feeling multiplied when you can’t see very well and are unsteady on your feet.
Motion sensor night lights around the house can help. They automatically switch on if your loved one gets up during the night. Exactly when falls are most likely to happen.
For flooring, you really want everything to be as consistent as possible. Thick carpet then hard flooring is a nightmare. Creating an uneven surface for socks and shoes. Try to use low pile carpet or hard flooring throughout where possible.
A couple of last-minute hacks to help you out…
- Apply some contrasting strips to the edge of each step — helps the eye distinguish where one ends and another begins
- Lever style door handles — avoid round doorknobs
- Get rid of cables by using cordless electricals where possible
- Store commonly used items within easy reach — avoiding the need to bend over or stretch
Most of these changes aren’t going to revolutionise the home safety of your elderly relatives. But implement enough of them, and you’ll greatly lower the risk of accidents. In turn giving you and your family peace of mind.
Quick Recap…
Home safety for elderly relatives isn’t as hard as you think.
Approach the process room by room, risk by risk. And before you know it, you’ve got a whole safer home. But don’t forget any of these:
- Supportive seating for elderly relatives is where you should start — they’ll spend a lot of time sitting down so make it comfy
- Install grab rails and ensure your elderly relatives can navigate freely around the home
- Update the bathroom with supportive aids and non-slip surfaces
- Consider lighting levels for the nighttime
- Fix any risky flooring transitions and remove trip hazards
Falls affect an estimated 34% of the UK population over 65 — so the sooner you futureproof your home, the better.
