Bathroom accidents are a common occurrence that can be difficult to avoid, yet often overlooked. The month of January is recognized as the National Awareness Month dedicated to bathroom safety, emphasizing the importance of safety and the precautions that should be taken in our bathrooms.
Preventing Bathroom Injuries
People often view bathroom safety as exclusively applicable to those with higher risks and limited mobility. However, the reality is that bathroom safety is beneficial for everyone. Bathroom falls generate close to 80% of adult injuries, while slips and falls account for 80% of Emergency Room visits.
Implementing safety accessories and procedures in your bath area can save you from being another statistic of a bathroom-related injury. Adding products such as floor grip, grab bars, and shower seats to your bath will strengthen the prevention of slips and falls.
Grab Bars
Grab bars are an excellent and more affordable option that offers support and stability in the event of a fall or slip, helping to provide better footing. They assist with various movements such as transitioning from standing to sitting, sitting to standing, and walking. Installed alongside the wall, grab bars are meant to be easily accessible and hold the weight of most adults. Grab bars come in many different shapes and sizes and are frequently made of metal. They are sometimes known as safety railings or safety handles, and are commonly used in public restrooms or shower spaces. They are usually seen with a straight and linear construction, but can also be waved, angled, or curved to better fit certain needs of assistance. Metal fabricated grab bars are most often mounted onto the wall with screws for more durable support and reliable security, yielding a higher weight capacity. This allows for more universal accessibility by bearing a higher downforce capacity, catering to people of different weights and strengths. Some grab bars are suctioned onto the wall- these are often made of plastic- an option for temporary use or less required weight support. They often are not as reliable as they can easily fail if not suctioned onto a surface properly.
Grab bars are very versatile and used in spaces outside the bathroom such as a hallway, stairway, swimming pool, in boats, or in RVs. They are an immensely helpful aid to individuals who are elderly, struggle with disabilities, are pregnant, or are post-surgery. Grab bars can be used for commercial or residential purposes, being applied right in your home, just for you. But don’t be discouraged if it’s the institutional look, seen in many common commercial grab bars, that you’re avoiding. Grab bars can stylishly fit the aesthetics of your home while providing safety and support in the places where you need it most.
Learn more about how Seachrome grab bars can provide you with needed safety. Check out the stylish selections here
Shower Seats
While grab bars provide support for movement, shower seats offer a stable and secure bathing experience. They allow individuals to remain stationary and sit comfortably without the risk of slipping in a wet environment. Shower seats, also known as shower chairs, shower benches, shower stools, and tub seats, carry many names to reflect the varying shapes and sizes offered. They can come with chair legs, without chair legs, be mounted, free-standing, and harbor other variations.
Transfer seats can have a bench-style seat, an L-shape seat, or a slide mechanism. Bench seats offer a simple rectangular surface and have all the similar benefits of an L-shape seat. An L-shaped seat enables easier transfer with wheelchair use and complies with American Disabilities Act (ADA) codes. Seats with a slide mechanism are usually in a chair style used for transferring between toilets and tubs.
Tub seats are fitted for tub use and usually rest on top of the tub’s dam. They can be a permanent or portable option, wall mounted, or with legs.
Free-standing shower seats are often in a chair or stool style and are a more affordable, portable, and non-permanent option, allowing users to move the chair freely as needed. Seats with legs are often adjustable to meet user and environment needs and comply with ADA code requirements. Seats with legs often can garner more stability and a higher weight capacity.
Wall-mounted shower seats are a great option that provides a permanent solution and often bear a higher weight capacity. Wall-mounted shower seats usually offer a fold-up feature allowing the user the flexibility to fold and set aside the seat when not in use, freeing up shower space without having to physically lift it out of place. Wall-mounted seats eliminate issues such as wobbling or displacement; ensuring a fixed position for reliability. Wall-mounted seats can also have legs for additional security or a backrest for additional comfort.
American Disabilities Act (ADA) Compliant folded wall-mounted seats fall under ADA Code 309.4 which requires a 5-pound maximum lift limit, allowing effortless folding and eliminating strain. But with large heavy-duty constructed seats, it can sometimes be difficult to make a seat ADA-compliant. There are different methods used to make seats compliant with ADA lift standards such as Seachrome’s patented technology, Lift-Assist™, a spring-supported mechanism that requires only less than 5 pounds of force to lift seats as heavy as 15 or more pounds.
Learn more about Lift-Assist™ and Seachrome Shower Seats here
Helpful Tips to Maximize Safety and Minimize Accidents
Bathroom safety extends beyond grab bars and shower seats, implementing other precautions is important to minimize the risk of slips and falls.
- Floor Grip: In addition to grab bars and shower seats, enhance bathroom safety with floor grip on mats and shower floors to add traction, eliminating slippery floors
- Towel Management: Keep towels nearby to wipe up any lingering moisture on the floors or around the sink. Utilize towel hooks or bars to safely hang towels and keep them off the floor, reducing the risks of slipping and tripping.
- Automatic Nightlight: Keep an automatic nightlight in the restroom to increase your visibility when it is dark, avoiding struggles to find the light switch and the risk of slipping or bumping into objects at night.
American Disabilities Act Codes Related to Seats and Grab Bars
The American Disabilities Act was enacted in 1990, created to eliminate discrimination amongst individuals with disabilities by making spaces more universally operable and accessible.
Grab Bars and shower seats are not always ADA compliant, but it is good practice to seek out ones that are to consider your accessibility options. ADA-compliant grab bars and shower seats are expected to meet specific design standards and fall into the plumbing elements and facilities section of the ADA code. Some compliant codes for grab bars and shower seats are:
Grab Bars:
- Section 604.5 – Grab Bars : A small section mentioning grab bars near toilets, stating, “Grab bars for water closets shall comply with 609. Grab bars shall be provided on the side wall closest to the water closet and on the rear wall.”
- Section 609 – Grab Bars : Section 609 is a full section dedicated to grab bars and includes multiple standards about grab bar placement and construction
Shower Seats:
- Section 610 – Seats : Section 610 is a full section dedicated to seating in bathtubs and showers, their construction and placement
- Section 309.4 – Operation : “Operable parts shall be operable with one hand and shall not require tight grasping, pinching, or twisting of the wrist. The force required to activate operable parts shall be 5 pounds (22.2 N) maximum.”
Bathroom Safety Beyond January
Bathroom safety often goes unnoticed, yet it plays a crucial role in everyday life. With multiple trips to the bathroom each day, it’s essential to be mindful of safe practices to protect oneself and the environment from potential risks. Bathroom safety measures also allow you to create a more universally acceptable environment. Implementing tools and accessories such as grab bars, shower seats, safety grip tape, mats, towel racks/hooks, and nightlights proves to be an effective and affordable way to ensure bathroom safety. Don’t leave bathroom safety to just the month of January; instead, make it a year-round practice.
Visit the Seachrome Website and see how we can assist you in ADA compliance and your bath safety journey: Seachrome.com
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