Frontpage eigude wheelchair blog

WHAT A WAY TO START THE NEW YEAR 2017!

In October 2016 I had to be transported to the hospital on a stretcher, my wheelchair in tow.

For days I had been lying in that hospital bed when my wife visited and tried to take a seat in my wheelchair. It was placed as usual at the head of the bed. Strangely, it would not move despite the released brakes.

It appeared that a nurse had placed the hospital bed by accident on one of the wheelchair brakes. The brake lever extension reached about 5 cm beyond the wheelchair and must have been in the way. When we learned that the frame had been damaged and there were no more spare parts available for this old wheelchair, I was close to tears. All the special parts and modifications: Speedy Electra/Bike, Stricker Bike, Mini-Trac, Free-Wheel, mountain bike wheels and – most importantly it fit on to the loading system of my car! Not to mention all the other special equipment (see older posts). What we have been through together… 500 blogs on the www.eigude.de by now!

There I was – dwelling on my total economic loss! After eight years we had built quite a relationship (sniff)!

Damage report was written, lots of phone calls were made. I spare you the details.

About three weeks later the clinic insurance asked to see invoices. Well, I had none because the wheelchair had been issued by my health insurance. They could not produce any papers either and since it was so old simply suggested to get a prescription for a new wheelchair. It would be handled between the insurances, nothing more required on my part.

On December 24th my first Christmas present arrived in form of a reimbursement confirmation for my supposedly new wheelchair. I was pleased!
Two weeks ago it was ready for pick-up at the sanitary supply store. We immediately switched a few parts over from the old one to the new Rolli (took 2.5 hours). The next day I already had to fill air in the tires and the day after I finally had a flat. The first flat tire in nine years!

Now look at what I have to get around with (click here).

Translator BW

I have nominated the FreeWheel 2012 as technical aid of the year.

I don’t want to repeat the whole blogpost here, so please see yourself the Blogpost 2012 FreeWheel.

It is a spoked wheel in the size of a children’s bicycle which you can clamp to the footrest in front of your wheelchair. This thing is ingenious and in permanent use for me.

Uneven paths, curbs, cobble stone, sand, gravel, grass and of course snow are no barrier anymore with the FreeWheel.

In the past the FreeWheel was only available for rigid frame wheelchairs. I bought from the inventor Patrick Dougherty his sample wheel for the trade fair and clamped it by magic on my foldable wheelchair with end-to-end footrest.

I sent him the pictures of my variant of wheelchair adaption, and he gave some thought about an adaptor.

After 2 years of development there is officially a FreeWheel Adaptor for foldable wheelchairs available since spring 2014.

Unfortunately only for wheelchairs with split footrest, as far as I understood.

FreeWheel adaptor for foldable wheelchairs

For questions as usual please contact: rollinator@eigude.de

Translator BL