Items to help in the home  

Even if elderly or disabled people are in receipt of home care, they are unlikely to have live-in help. There are many items that can help make life easier, and some of these may be provided by Social Services, who may also be able to give grants towards purchasing certain items. Charities such as Help the Aged or Age Concern may also be able to help with assistance for items if someone is in receipt of benefits or domiciliary care.  

Many items are well known: stairlifts, bath seats, hand rails etc, are popular items that can help if there is limited mobility. But it is the smaller, everyday tasks that people often have trouble with. For example, opening medicine bottles is a real problem if they have adult caps. Pharmacists can provide easy open caps if requested to. Likewise, opening jars can be very difficult, but there are various gadgets available to make this easier.  

Bending down is tough for many people and easy-reach grabber tools are really useful if it is difficult to get down low. Many household items such as dustpans and brushes or feather dusters are also available with long handles. 

Electrical items can be difficult to operate sometimes due to low sockets and small switches. There are several possible solutions to this problem. It is possible to get socket adaptors that can be fixed to the wall to raise the sockets. Also there are plugs and plug adaptors that can make removing them easier. A third possible solution, and excellent for lamps, are remote control devices or timers. 

Whatever the needs a person has, there are solutions to help them cope when an elderly care worker is not available.