This History of Medicare Lift Chairs and Safety

With the onset of arthritis, there are many daily tasks that can become much more difficult to preform. For many seniors with arthritis, standing up is very hard, especially after having watched a television program or taken a nap, which is as a result of not moving for an hour or two. As a result, not only is standing difficult for these seniors, but it can also increase the risk of a fall.

One way that this issue is addressed is by using a lift chair. Lift chairs are like recliners, but the entire chair can be raised to make it much easier to get into or out of the chair.

The History and Development of the Lift Recliner

The lift chair is a powerful tool that in the grand scheme of things hasn’t been around for all that long. The first lift chairs were developed during the early 1980′s, where their popularity quickly became apparent. Unfortunately, as is often the case, the first lift chairs were not very well made or even very safe.

There were two major factors that caused the first lift chairs to not provide a very safe or reliable service. The first was that there were no official lift chair manufactures at this time, so those that were making them were just taking a regular recliner and adding a lifting system to it. Often, these chairs weren’t of high quality to begin with and they were certainly never intended to be raised and lowered several times a day. As a result, the frame of these chairs could not withstand the stress of daily use.

The other major problem with the first lift chairs was the lifting system itself. The early manufactures would use a spring lift system, which had a number of problems. However, the biggest problem with a spring lift chair is that once you start it moving, you can’t stop it. So, if you accidentally hit the release or are otherwise unprepared when it begins to raise, it is possible to fall out of the chair.

A Better Safer Lift Chair is Developed and Embraced

This went on for a few years, with a number of poor quality lift chair manufactures entering the lift chair market. However, by the mid eighties, two companies had emerged and begun to develop custom built electric lift chairs. These companies, Golden Technologies and Pride Mobility, saw the glaring problems with other lift chair designs and set out to make a better lift recliner.

Today, Pride Lift Chairs and Golden Lift Chairs continue to make quality lift recliners, leading the industry in quality and reliability. Golden Technologies and Pride Mobility also both make a number of other types of home medical equipment. Their contribution, the electric lift chair, has also become the industry standard, with spring lift chairs becoming almost obsolete.

Medicare Lift Chairs

While Pride Lift Chairs and Golden Lift Chairs are in large part responsible for increasing the quality and safety of lift recliners, Medicare also played a part and Medicare Lift Chairs coverage is something that was affected.

Shortly after the first lift chair was developed, Medicare lift chair claims began to skyrocket. Within a few short years, the number of claims increased exponentially, until Medicare lift chairs was one of the most expensive costs to Medicare.

This, in addition to safety concerns, led congress to change the way Medicare Lift Chairs were covered. They decided to only cover lift chairs that used an electric lifting system, so spring lift chairs were no longer covered. Congress also voted to only cover the actual cost of the lifting mechanism and not the entire chair.

Today, Medicare Lift Chairs are covered in the same manner, with only up to $300 provided for the actual lifting mechanism.