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For about the past year I have been helping my friend Richard. He is 68 and has post polio syndrome. He has a medicare Kaiser plan. He can't walk without help, and if he falls I can't get him up. This has been a bad week, twice he has ended up on the floor. He doesn't truly fall, he tries to stand, his legs are not strong enough so he slides from the edge of his power lift chair to the floor. Tonight I had to get a neighbor come pick him up and put him in bed. His legs are extra weak right now, he has a cough with chest congestion. He got a flu shot and has not been around anybody sick. I need a way to be able to help him up, I think it is called a patient lift. How do I get his doctor to give him one?

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I have used the lifts before. Usually he ends up sitting on the floor with his back against the footrest of the chair. His legs are weak but he can stand with his walker, so I am thinking with a chest harness and the hydraulic thing it would work to help him get up. Need to talk to his doctor. I got him in to see urgent care just now, he has a touch of pneumonia and will be on an inhaler, cough syrup, and two antibiotics so hopefully that will get him back to his normal.
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Ahmijoy Mar 2020
Just a comment—the hydraulic lift is the one you have to pump up yourself. If the person you are lifting is on the heavier side, this is very difficult, especially if they are on the floor, even sitting up against a chair. I’m not familiar with a “chest harness”. My husband’s was one that went around his waist and he kind of sat in it.
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My husband has the same issue We are on Medicare but they paid nothing toward it.

The patient lifts will not work to get someone up off the floor. If Richard tends to slide out of his chair, it will be very difficult to place the lift sling under him, hook it up on the lift and operate the lift to lift him back into his chair. It would require Herculean strength and effort. Plus, my husband has anxiety attacks each time I tried to use it.
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Craigs List and FB marketplace usually has good deals on medical equipment
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Do you mean a house lift? The doctor doesn’t “give” him one. The doctor writes a prescription and then you have to get Kaiser to agree that it’s medically necessary if you want them to pay for it.
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LS2234 Mar 2020
That is what I mean, how to get the dr to SAY he needs it in order to have it, or if there is some other option, device, whatever. He is in between income levels, he really ought to be in a facility but cant afford one,yet he gets a little too much to be in a state paid place or qualify for the state medi caid plan.
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