A bathroom can be dangerous, leading to injuries, especially for seniors. Slippery floors, hard surfaces, and sharp corners pose significant risks. Therefore, when designing a bathroom for seniors, considering their needs that both protect them and give them back a sense of dignity and autonomy is very crucial. There are features and fixtures you can include in bathrooms for elderly people to help them take care of themselves.
This blog will reveal how you can design a bathroom that meets the needs of seniors and allows them to control their hygiene.
What to Consider in Bathroom Remodels for Seniors
Older people have specific needs you need to consider to ensure that they have a bathroom they’re comfortable using. While these needs may differ since every senior has a different living situation, you should consider the following during a bathroom remodel:
Safety
Seniors are prone to grave injuries from burns from hot water and falls in bathrooms. Therefore, designing a bathroom for an older person needs to consider those dangers. You’ll need to think of the worst-case scenarios and install features that counter or minimize them. Moreover, you’ll need to transform the bathroom to make getting emergency treatment faster.
Independence
Despite the dangers that seniors face in bathrooms, they should still have a right to dignity and independence. So, when you’re designing a bathroom for the elderly, you should ensure it includes features that make this space more accessible to them. Then, they’ll feel more autonomous and able to take care of their own hygiene.
In particular, you should account for the aids they’ll need to use in this space, such as a wheelchair or walker. In addition, you need to keep in mind their likely worsening eyesight and decreasing mobility and lack of strength, which may worsen with time.
Comfort
The next consideration in bathroom remodeling for seniors is comfort. Even if the senior who will use this bathroom is strong, you should still remodel it to ensure they can comfortably use it. Otherwise, these older people may not keep their hygiene as they should.
For the most comfortable bathroom, you’ll need to include the elderly person in the design process. Listening to their concerns and ideas is crucial to making this remodel convenient and comfortable for them.
Style
Lastly, you should consider style in the bathroom remodels for seniors. When you’re making such an investment into their life, you should also consider the style the senior in question prefers. While design choices can minimize dangers, such as opting for a round counter edge, it should still go along with their preferences. Simply because you need this space to be functional and safe doesn’t mean it can’t be stylish.
What to Include in Senior-Friendly Bathroom Designs?
Now that you know what you should consider in this remodel, here are key elements you should include in this bathroom design:
1. Walk-in Shower/Bathtub
The bathroom design should include either a walk-in tub or a shower. Usually, a shower is better for seniors, but in either case, these are the best designs for the elderly. Their low ledge makes them outshine other types of tubs and showers, allowing older people to ‘walk-in’ without raising their legs. This is easier for seniors to use, especially if they have reduced mobility. Moreover, these facilities have support bars that make lowering yourself into a bath easier. You can also add a seat to make bathing/showering more comfortable and less tiring for seniors. Plus, these walk-in facilities prevent burns and falls.
2. Easy-to-Use Features
Other elements you should add to bathrooms for the elderly are easy-to-use features. For example, you should add the following features:
- Large Controls: You should ensure any controls, such as buttons and switches, are large.
- Lever Handles: Instead of round handles that require a twisting motion, you should install handles with levers. You should also avoid installing drawers, and cabinet doors with finger holds since they require strength and dexterity to open. Nevertheless, the best bathroom idea for the elderly is to install fixtures, furniture, and other facilities that lack handles.
- Sensor Facilities: You should include facilities that use sensors so that these elderly people don’t have to make difficult motions such as twisting a knob. In particular, you can add sensors to your lighting, faucet, and soap/shampoo dispenser.
- Magnifying Mirrors: You should install mirrors that are easier for them to see through.
- Grab Rails
Another element you should include in this type of remodeling is grab rails or bars. These bars support your weight as you lower or lift yourself. More specifically, you should install these support bars on either side of the toilet and bath. In addition, unlike towel bars, you should ensure these rails can support an adult’s weight.
3. Accessibility Features
Bathroom renovations for the elderly should include the following accessibility features:
- Wide Walkways: There should be enough space to walk through the bathroom without bumping into furniture or anything else. Therefore, you should ensure a wheelchair can easily fit and turn as needed.
- No Door: You should avoid having a door, but if there is one, it should slide open.
- Wide Doorways: You should ensure that if there’s a doorway, it’s wide enough for emergency services to pass through.
- Weak Lock: While you should protect an older person’s privacy, their bathroom’s lock should be easy to break in case they need emergency assistance.
- High Toilet Seat
Senior-friendly bathroom designs should include a high toilet. These ‘comfort’ height toilets are 17” – 19” high, while the average toilet is 15” high. Older people may find using these toilets easier since they don’t need to lower themselves as much, and standing back up is less strenuous. Usually, this feature comes as a seat you can add to a standard toilet.
4. Anti-Scald Features
Since burns are a high concern for older people, you should include anti-scalding features in this remodel. Therefore, in bathrooms for the elderly, you should ensure that the external plumbing doesn’t transfer heat. Additionally, you should include plumbing that dilutes hot water to ensure faucets and shower heads never burn.
5. Anti-Slip Surfaces
Another element you should include in your remodel design is an anti-slip feature. Falls are common in bathrooms, and they’re especially dangerous to the elderly. Therefore, you should install floors made of less slippery materials, affix rugs to the floor, and cover the bottom of shower pans and tubs with an anti-slip material.
6. Easy-to-Reach Storage
Finally, elderly bathrooms need storage that’s within reach without having to bend over or crouch. This helps the seniors easily access these areas and also ensures there’s a space where they can store their things. Otherwise, they may leave things on the floor, which could trip them. In addition, you should have easy-to-open storage – or even forgo any cabinet doors.
Recap
Now you know that you need to consider safety, independence, comfort, and style when designing a bathroom remodel for seniors. By keeping these considerations in mind, you can create a design that’s aesthetically pleasing to the older person and also convenient and safe for them.
Moreover, you should include features that reflect these considerations. For instance, anti-slip surfaces can help with safety. Meanwhile, grab rails can give seniors a sense of independence since they can now use a toilet, bath, and shower by themselves. Therefore, use the list above in your next senior bathroom transformation.