Question
Hi - My 100 year old dad does not have much control over his legs (Charcot-Marie-Tooth disease, a genetic disease that works on nervous system, and increasingly his hands.  He has been using a wheelchair for about 20 years, but recently the disease has advanced sufficiently that he cannot even stand, assisted, for more than 3 or 4 seconds.  This makes moving from the wheelchair to/from the bed, the toilet, his armchair, and the sofa on the porch, increasingly difficult, and his caregivers, including me, are beginning to feel strains in our backs.

The potential solution I thought of had two parts:
1) Get a "transport wheelchair," with removable arms, so that after the appropriate arm has been removed he can just slide from the chair to a bed etc easily without the wheelchair wheel getting in the way.
2) Get a good transfer board.

I could use your advice particularly on the transfer boards.  I抳e looked them up on the internet, and there seem to be many kinds.  I would be willing to pay for the Beasy Trans Transfer Board if it really worked.   Ditto the 揝lide 慛 Roll?board (KM Concepts), and the 揜oll Easy?or 揝cooter?transfer boards (both at Sammons Preston Rolyan).  My dad is not heavy (perhaps 125 pounds).   Because I only go home once a month, I can抰 just get these things and try them out and return them if they don抰 work.  Do you have any advice as to what would work well?  My dad has difficulty even inching along the bed (I should mention too that his coxix hurts a lot and that his skin breaks very easily and because of his blood thinners he bleeds a lot.  So it抯 important that whatever we do be easy, even if it抯 easy-and-slow.)

On the transport chairs I could also use advice.  I found one that seems to have most of the features I need:  1) removable arms; 2) narrow (so it fits in the bathroom).  (This is the 揜emovable Armrest Transport Wheelchair?at 1-800-wheelchair.com.)  The other feature I would like is larger back wheels, but I couldn抰 find them with the removable armrest AND the narrower seat.  (Eventually I will want two, however, one for upstairs, where we need to get through the doors and thus need narrow, and one for downstairs, where we don抰 need narrow.)  When the arms are removed, there shouldn抰 be any pipe sticking up the way there is on his present wheelchair, because he sometimes scrapes himself on these during the transfer.  One of the wheelchairs offered 揻lip-back armrests,?but I didn抰 know if these would really flip all the way back and really get out of the way.  If they would, that would probably be preferable, because it sounds easier.  (This is the 揟ravel-Lite Premium Transport Wheelchair at 1-800-wheelchair.com ?it would be for downstairs, because it doesn抰 seem to come in the narrow size.  It also doesn抰 have bigger back wheels and the 揹esk type?arms aren抰 as good for our purposes, but that抯 okay.)

Do you have any advice for me?  I would love to just try all these products and see which makes the most sense, but that doesn抰 see to be possible.

Thanks so much!
-- Jane Mansbridge  

Answer
I am sorry, but I cannot offer advice on brands, or recommend specific devices unless I can see and work with the client.

You would make your job a lot easier if you could bring your dad over to a decent home health supply store or two and see what they have and can recommend. Most larger drugstores have home health care departments, and any local wheelchair vendor can help as well.

This allows you to not only see what things are and how they work, but the staff might be able to help see if you qualify for Medicare, medicaid, or other assistance.

In general, however, it sounds like your ideas are pretty solid. I would add that you may want to look at sites like www.ocelco.com as well.

Good luck!