Even at the age of 93, you can still look forward to passing your driving test. This is exactly the case with Ilse Dumsch. She passed her driving test and now has her driver’s license in her hands – but the one for the walker. She has just completed walker safety training at the Arnum retirement home near Hanover. Now she is fit for the rounds with the rollator.
The exercises for the training were put together by the occupational therapist Betina Kerzel. It starts for the seven women and two men with a round of walking walkers on the large square in front of the old people’s home. Candlel first observes the residents handling the vehicle, shortly thereafter calls everyone to him and asks them to let their arms hang loosely at their sides. When your hands are at the level of the rollator handlebars, the handlebars are in the correct position. But that is only the case for two participants – for the others, the handlebars are set much too high. So, Kerzel readjusts.
The same goes for the brakes. Candlel asks the seniors to put on the brakes and at the same time push their vehicle forward. The rear wheels would then have to lock, but this is not the case with three models. The trainer marks the rollators with colorful sticky dots – later she will make sure that the defects are rectified.
In an aging society, women and men with walkers are becoming more and more part of everyday traffic. But not everyone knows how to deal with it right away. That is why the German Road Safety Service and other organizers, among others, offer special training courses. “I’ve been dependent on the walker for a good two years,” says 93-year-old Ilse Dumsch. “I’m out and about in the village with it every day.” The rollator is a great help to stay mobile.
“One hand always on the rollator”
However, she wants to learn how to use it safely in the course in her retirement home. Among other things, trainer Kerzel practices with the seniors how to sit down and stand up safely (“always keep one hand on the rollator, lock the brakes,” she says). The participants then practice overcoming a high curb. Kerzel shows how it’s done: First you push the rollator right up to the curb, then you take a lunge step and apply the brake. Then pull the rollator slightly towards you and tilt it so that the front wheels are in the air, release the brake and put the front wheels on the pavement; finally push the rear wheels behind.
That’s a lot of individual steps, and even Kerzel admits that. Each of the participants has to concentrate intensely, the movements have to be coordinated – it’s not easy. Some people sometimes confuse briefly applying the brakes with locking the brakes.
In addition, if you have been on the move with a rollator for a long time, it is sometimes not so easy for you to give up certain driving habits. Some prefer to lift the rollator instead of tilting it – the argument that a rollator fully loaded from shopping would probably be too heavy to lift and it could quickly lead to a fall when trying to do so does not help. Candlel and two helpers let each person complete the exercise one after the other and stand right next to them to be able to provide assistance if necessary.
Health insurance companies only pay for certain models
And: Not every rollator is the same. In 2019, Stiftung Warentest took a closer look at a total of twelve models – and found significant differences: for example in the equipment (tipping aid, back belt and reflectors are not always standard) and the weight, which varied between around six and 10.2 kilograms. There were also differences in the frame materials (carbon, aluminum or steel) – and of course in the price. Inexpensive rollators were already available for 60 euros, the more expensive models were more than 530 euros.
In addition, according to the Stiftung Warentest, health insurance companies often only approve the cheaper standard rollators, whose frames are made of steel and therefore weigh a lot, when a doctor’s prescription is presented. According to the testers, they are difficult to fold because of their bulky folding mechanism and there is a risk of injury. They are also hardly suitable for outdoor use. The models under 100 euros usually lack tilting aids (which would be important because of the high weight) as well as back straps.
Light walkers, on the other hand, are only paid for in full by most health insurance companies if there is a medical indication on the prescription, for example because of weakness in the arms. Without such an indication, the health insurers often only pay the so-called flat-rate supply, which roughly corresponds to the price of a cheap model – you have to pay the difference to a more expensive and better equipped model yourself.
Course with water buckets
During training in the senior citizens’ residence, the participants now have to master a kind of obstacle course that Kerzel set up. In the slalom, they have to roll their walkers past buckets of water that are about one meter apart on the ground. In addition, it is necessary to overcome a wooden pallet, to pass a wavy carpet without stumbling and to leave small speed bumps behind without touching them. Sometimes it works better, sometimes not so well.
Some seniors walk leaning forward with their rollator, others do not have their feet between the wheels. Some look at the ground and not at the traffic, bumps are easily underestimated; some also forget to apply the brake when sitting down. Trainer Kerzel addresses the typical mistakes and shows how to do it better. In any case, the courses in the retirement home are always fully booked.
At the end, Ilse Dumsch draws a positive conclusion. “The training was good,” she says. Among other things, the trainer drew her attention to the fact that one of her brakes was not working properly. “Even when driving, you can quickly make a lot of mistakes,” says the senior citizen. But now she is prepared. “I feel safer now.”