How to use a walker with a seat (Rollator)... the RIGHT way

do you have a walker with the seat or maybe you call it a four-wheeler or a Rollator if you do use one of these you know the benefits that come with using one of these it has a seat which is a huge plus because if you get tired you can sit down safely and it has a basket in the bottom you can put stuff in but did you know there are hidden dangers associated with using one of these and if you don't use these the right way you could end up falling and breaking your hip or worse in this video I'm going to show you how to use the Walker and some hidden dangers at the end of the video that you must know in order to stay safe when you're using one of these I'm Dr Sean your PT guy and our videos help you learn how to move better and stay independent so you can enjoy your life let's get started disclaimer so when do you actually want to use one of these Walkers when is it appropriate for you a standard Walker is nice because it's more stable in general but it doesn't have a seat so you're kind of limited to your endurance of how far you can go like for instance if you try to walk outside with one of those Walkers you're not going to be able to sit down if you get tired whereas one of these you can sit down if you do it appropriately and I'll show you how to do that in a little bit a three-wheel walker on the other hand is nice for moving into corridors that are very narrow however they can tip over on you and you have to be extra careful with one of those those are the least stable ones out of all the walkers so the walk over the seat has three major advantages over the other walkers one it has four wheels those four wheels can glide over the uneven concrete or over rugs a little bit easier than the other walkers especially the standard Walker or the skis on the back the second is the seat the seat is critical the seat is the best part about this walker because if you have weaker legs and you're just trying to build up strength in your legs and you're trying to go further distances you can actually lock the Walker turn around and sit down safely which I'm about to show you in a moment and then you can rest your legs and then get up and keep going further and then if you need to take a break you can sit down and the same thing you just rinse and repeat you can go a lot further on this walker than you can in the three-wheeler or the standard Walker so this is an amazing machine the third cool part about this walker is the storage compartment this one like most of them have a little basket underneath and you can put different things in there whether it's your purse or you can put in books down in there that you're reading like this one oh look at that or you can even put in your oxygen tank if it's small enough you can put it over there and tuck it in there and the cord comes out and it can be on your nose and you can go on your way so the wheels the seat in the storage make this walker an excellent Walker to use if you know how to use it safely now how are you supposed to stand up in this walker well first of all whenever you're measuring the Walker you want to stand as tall as you can alright is try to stand up as tall as you can I know not everyone's going to be able to stand up as tall because the spinal stenosis arthritis a whole lot of litany of ailments and issues but if you are able to stand up just try to stand up as tall as you can drop your hand down at the side and if that handle goes to your wrist that's about right where you want to put it okay this is the little knobby here that you undo and then you can just move this up and down and then you can tighten it once you've got it the right height mine's at the right height so we're good there and then you just stand looking ahead and you start trying to walk so once you've got the Walker at the right height by your wrist you hold on to your Walker you try to keep it close to you when you're walking if you let it get too far out in front of you like this then what happens and if you've seen this you know what's going to happen you're going to let it get too far out in front of me and you can't really pick up your feet and then you're going to go down and your nose is going to get smushed and it's going to be pointing the wrong direction we don't want that keep your nose in the right direction okay so keep the Walker close by when you're walking and it's going to look more like this when you have your hands down at your side and just kind of keep it keep your elbows at your side and just grab on there and look ahead and you're going like this okay smooth walking just don't let it get too far in front of you okay that's the first part about walking now let's say we want to sit down let's say you're walking to Walmart or you're walking somewhere or even just around the house and there's not really a place to sit down there's no chair or maybe the chair is just outside of your reach and you're like I don't know if I'm going to be able to make it over there and if I try I may end up tripping and falling or getting tired and weak and then my legs may give out and I may go down thankfully you have a seat so here's where most people go wrong though when they try to do this when someone's using one of these Walkers they inevitably will lock it not by well the first thing is they'll think this locks it that's not how it locks squeezing this brake like this it actually locks by pressing down okay you press it down and you'll hear a click click okay and then once it's locked then they try to sit down like this they turn around and they sit like this okay ah and they get to relax this is nice all right especially if you're waiting in a long line sometimes I've looked over at someone in one of these Walkers and they were sitting on one and I was waiting in the line I'm like man I wish I had one of those right now but I didn't so you do though so that's nice so if you if someone were to get up from here here's the issue when someone tries to stand up from this position even if they have pretty decent technique The Walker itself can slide on you okay I weigh 175 pounds on a good day okay now 175 pounds versus a machine a walker that's like maybe 10 pounds 175 pounds is gonna win who's gonna win a semi truck or a motorcycle the semi truck I'm the semi truck yes I'm a semi truck and this is more like a motorcycle so if a semi truck smashes into a motorcycle that thing is just going to be demolished same thing with me if I try to move my body 175 pounds against this machine that's 10 pounds it's gonna move on you okay so if I try to get up and I'm pushing my legs back like this it's it's sliding back okay that's not good number one your wheels may not even be tight like my wheels a little loose down there as well but the key is even if your wheel is perfectly tight it's still going to slide on you okay so what should you do one you should remember the nose or rear toes you try to bring your feet back like that you get to the edge of the seat a little bit more you put your hands down there you bring your nose over your toes and then you use some momentum to try to get up but you're just going to have to lean super far forward and push yourself up okay that's the safe way to do it but again if you're just getting up and it's pretty good it's going to slide back on you okay this the machine will slide out from under you and I cannot tell you how many people have come to see me in the hospital or I've gone to see them in home health or when I was in the rehab setting when people ended up in rehab because they were using one of these and they parked it in the middle of nowhere and it was locked the wheels weren't moving at all but they tried to get up and it slid out from under them they fell and broke their hip now they've got hospitalization they've got a poor quality of life they may end up in rehab short-term stay not good okay so what should you do instead okay here's what you do when you're walking and you feel like you just gotta take a break you gotta find something that is immovable a surface or an object that you can park The Walker up against that's not going to move when you try to stand up like a wall or the end of a couch or a car one of those parking curb things or even a car bumper or a wall except where wherever you are a countertop just when you're walking and you're getting tired try to park it up against the wall like this and it's got the rub rise bumper there so you're okay there and then you lock it you push down okay and then you turn yourself around and then you sit okay so every time you try to get up now that wall is not moving the Walker's not moving and you're safe that's the whole point we got to stay safe so you can stay independent and enjoy your life so here's another thing that people get wrong all right so sometimes they do this part perfectly great and it looks great but when they get up and they unlock the Walker they think they should bring it around with them and then it ends up swirling and they end up swirling and falling down like this they stand up and then they unlock it right here first oh that's not a good sound if you're a physical therapist you hear that you're like please don't do that okay not yet anyways okay so they unlock it and then either they start moving themselves and it starts moving that's not safe or worse they stand still and they try to bring this around like this and they end up almost tripping and falling and they do fall not not wise so what do you do what's the safe way so from here you stand up okay and then you keep it locked your hands are still holding on you turn your body around so you're facing the Walker like this okay back up a little bit it's still locked now you unlock it click click and now you come on like this and you're off and you're going that's the way to use one of these safely okay now let's talk a little bit about the seat the little bit about the seat this seat is amazing what I like about this seat is it you can hold your purse you can hold oxygen in here you can put a ton of things in here and you can even put a nice plate of food especially my wife's food you can put a plate of my Wise food on top and it's delicious yum and then you can bring that with you and you don't have to try to hold on to the plate and bring you know the plate over and all these other things in your silverware you can plop it right on the seat and bring it over to your dinner table delicious especially with my wife so amazing now last little thing let's say you want to go further distance that's why you use the seat the seat is going to help build up your strength in your legs which is the advantage of using this walker you can go 100 feet take a break if you get tired or just before you get tired sit down take a break another 100 feet take a break another 100 feet take a break you're not limited to where there's a seat you can go walk in the mall in the air-conditioned mall you can go further distances and build up that strength again using one of these walkers but you got to know how to do it safely when you're sitting down like I said what do you do if there is no wall around what if you're in the middle of a parking lot and there are no Park there's no cars and there's no parking curbs or what do you do or maybe you're on the sidewalk and you're walking in your neighborhood what do you do well in the front wheels if you park that sometime you got to be tricky this is a little tricky okay sometimes in some instances you can lock it up a lock it with the front two wheels kind of in the grass a little bit if it's in the grass it's less likely to be moving okay so that's helpful it can be helpful but it's it's it's not Optimum okay it's really you got to be careful with that if someone's walking with you too they can just put their foot at the back when it's locked and they can just kind of keep their foot here or they could just stand right here while you're trying to get up from there okay so that's another way to do it but the key is just these machines these Walkers are amazing you just got to use it in a safe way so that's how you do it so now you know how to use one of these Walkers appropriately and safely these are great Walkers if it's the right fit for your specific situation they help improve your balance they help improve the endurance they can improve your leg strength by giving you more endurance because of the seat and you can store things in there Like Oxygen or other things like your purse or even books like this don't fall that's my book that's cool so speaking of not falling if you want a free home fall prevention guide you can click the link down in the description below and if you want more videos like this one to help you learn how to move better and stay independent so you can enjoy your life click the Subscribe button down below and we'll see you in the next video

Channel: Your PT Guy

Views: 1,223,442

Keywords: Rollator, walker with a seat, walker with seat, walker with wheels, wheeled walker, four wheeled walker, 4 wheeled walker, 4 wheel walker, walker, prevent fall, prevent a fall, prevent falls, fall down, fell down, walker with oxygen, elderly, aging, senior, shane waller, sean waller, shane walker, sean walker, shawn walker, dont fall, don't fall, dont fall down, don't fall down

Id: adCKjAHKVW8

Length: 14min 36sec (876 seconds)

Published: Tue May 02 2023