Over 50? Keeping Up With Your Healthcare Needs

Over 50? Keeping Up With Your Healthcare Needs

Getting Up And Getting Down: How Lift Chairs Can Help After Hip Surgery

Nellie Ryan

A total hip replacement is a very painful process, but one which must be done if you can no longer walk or you have broken your hip. After you have the surgery and you are working with a physical therapist to heal and to walk again, you may find that you still have a lot of pain and difficulty getting up and sitting down. Since movement is so important to your healing, you cannot opt to stay in bed until your surgical incisions have healed. A lift chair can help, and here is how.

Regaining Movement Slowly but Surely

In the first couple of weeks after surgery, you will want to take things nice and slow. This does not mean you should not move at all. In fact, most orthopedic surgeons suggest that once you are cleared to leave the hospital, you are ready to begin moving. However, you do have to move more slowly than you did before surgery (if you could move at all then). A lift chair can be prescribed to help you get up and sit down. The chair slowly raises you to a standing position, which can help your muscles and your new hip adjust to the movement required to stand. When you want to sit, you back into the raised chair and press the buttons to slowly lower you into a sitting or reclining position. 

Retraining Muscles to Work with the Metal Hip

Hip replacements are almost always made of surgical steel. The muscles that typically surround the bones of your hip have to be reattached in a different manner, which means you need to retrain these muscles to work with the metal hip. The steady up and down movement of a lift chair aids in that process. It is a good idea to use this chair to rest in whenever possible. That way, when you need to get up to use the bathroom, answer the door, or fix something to eat, your muscles and metal hip are getting exactly the type of muscle memory workout they need.

Providing Gentle Comfort after Physical Therapy

Until you have made a full recovery, you will be expected to see a physical therapist. The sessions with the physical therapist may be very painful at first, but the pain will gradually diminish as your muscles adapt and get stronger and moving with the metal hip becomes more natural. In the meantime, you may find that your derriere and hips are quite fatigued or sore after your therapy sessions. Sitting for too long just to get some post-therapy comfort may leave you stiff. The lift chair will help you by first providing some cushion-y comfort and then by helping you stand again so that you do not become too stiff.


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About Me
Over 50? Keeping Up With Your Healthcare Needs

As an adult in my 50s, I find that my body isn't as strong as it used to be. But I don't let that stop me from enjoying life! In fact, I make every effort to get the treatments I need from my doctor to improve my health. I know that I'm not a senior yet, but I do all I can to prevent the health problems that affect that age group. Because of this, I put together a health blog for people over age 50. My blog isn't a review of what you can easily find on the Internet. It's a plethora of unique information designed to help you find the services you need fast. What my blog doesn't do is tell you what to do for your health. Instead, it offers guidance and options. Please, enjoy the blog and happy reading.

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