The hierarchy of mobility begins with bed mobility. Improving a client’s overall bed mobility is extremely important to ensure that the client is not in one position for too long resulting in pressure wounds over their boney prominences. Next, is bed to mat transfers. Followed by wheelchair transfers, to bed transfers, to functional ambulation for ADL’s, to the toilet, to the tub, eventually working up to car transfers, and then beginning working on functional ambulation for community mobility, and then lastly driving. As you restore confidence in mobility and move up the client has more and more of a sense of independence. Speaking firsthand, from someone who suffered a traumatic accident and has spent 2 months in a wheelchair secondary to a non-weight bearing orders. The hierachy gave me something to look forward to. Something minor like getting out of the bed and moving to a mat is not minor at all for someone who otherwise would have no choice. It gradually works to give the
It is very important to properly fit your clients for their assistive device(s). Not only is it implementing client centered practice by taking in the client’s physical condition, age, endurance, and psychological condition in to account to ensure that they get the most out of their device. Proper and accurate measures are also crucial to ensure that these devices be fit properly to the individual client because they will most likely need them for 5 or more years due to insurance purposes. Assistive devices provide clients with the stability, strength, and balance they will need to actively engage in their daily occupations so ensuring that the client can use them to reach their maximum independence is very important. Fitting for these devices is very important to be done as accurately as possible to ensure proper body mechanics. If the device is too low, it will cause poor body mechanics and cause more problems than they began with. Furthermore, a walker being too low for th