The Evolution of the Lift Chair

In cities all over the united states, seniors have come to rely upon special devices, known as lift chairs, to make standing without assistance possible. While today, the modern lift chair is a very safe and reliable device, this was not always the case.

The lift chair was first developed during the early nineteen-eighties. It was designed to allow an individual with limited mobility to stand without requiring assistance. They quickly became very popular, especially among seniors.

Since lift chairs were a fairly new type of mobility lifting aid, there were no set standards and instead, a number of different manufacturers began creating lift chairs. However, they were not building these chairs themselves, but were instead taking a recliner someone else built and adding a lifting system to the base of the chair.

There were a number of problems with the lifting systems, which will be discussed later in detail, but there were also a number of problems with the durability of the lift chairs frames. This is because a traditional recliner, while very solid, is not made to be raised and lowered on a regular basis. The frames of these early lift chairs were simply not designed to deal with the stress of being raised and lowered on a regular basis, so there was a big problem with the durability of early lift chairs.

While the stress put on the frames of these early lift chairs did greatly reduce the overall life of the chair, the lifting system which was used was actually of much greater concern. This is because the early lift chairs used a spring lift component. This spring lift component was very inexpensive, but had a number of problems, with the biggest problem being that once the spring was activated, it could not be stopped.

The spring lifting component posed a great deal of problems for those who accidentally activated it, without meaning to, or those who experienced a problem as the lift chair was being raised, but were unable to stop the chair from moving.

With a large number of companies making these shoddily built lift chairs, and making a good deal of money doing so, it would not be surprising for this trend to continue for some time. However, luckily for the mobility challenged towards the middle of the 1980′s, two companies emerged that would change the way lift chairs were built. These companies, who were both founded by engineers with medical experience, saw the many problems with the way lift chairs were being built and decided to do something about it.

The companies, Golden Technologies and Pride Mobility, started by custom building the lift chairs frame. This allowed them to guarantee that the lift chair would be able to deal with the stress of being raised and lowered throughout the day. Using high quality wood and advanced building techniques, Pride and Golden were able to create a safe reliable frame that would not break or become weakened.

Pride Lift Chairs and Golden Lift Chairs also both used an electrical lifting system, instead of the spring system common in the earlier lift chairs. They saw the dangers that were associated with using a spring lifting system, which offered no control for the user, and realized that using this system would be quite unsafe.

Instead by using an electric lifting system, they allowed the person using the chair to be in complete control of when the chair raised. Using a constant pressure system, these manufacturers were able to create a lift chair that would only move while the user pushed the button. If something happened or the button was pushed accidentally, the lift chair would not raise. The electric system also allowed for the backrest and footrest to be operated electronically, resulting in a lift chair that was much more comfortable.

The changes that Pride Mobility and Golden Technologies implemented during the mid-eighties would change the lift chair industry. The consumer quickly noticed the difference in quality and safety, forcing other manufacturers to either follow the lead of Golden and Pride, or be forced out of business. By the time Medicare decided they would not cover the spring lift chair in the early nineties, many companies had already switched to making only electric lift chairs.

Today, more than 20 years later, Pride Lift Chairs and Golden Lift Chairs are the most popular kinds. They are still made to the same high standard and both companies have branched out into other markets, manufacturing a number of different types of home medical equipment.