Shocking Experiences: When Mobility Aids are Taken Away

I hope you are all having a good weekend? Do feel free to share any experiences you may have about being separated from your mobility aids. And if you have any tips, make sure to share them as well. Links mentioned Restrictive practise. www.england.nhs.uk/wp-content/uploads/2022/07/Rest… Videos mentioned Why I use a wheelchair if I can walk. https://youtu.be/qeTg_5JadO4?si=-EtpAmdvPekNq0Zy Dumped in an aisle chair for 2 hours https://youtu.be/twKGV6ROOoc?si=SY-_PBlidYS8-esr Videos you may enjoy Reacting to that viral video https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lK_l72YGhww&t=662s Disability News https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WPVaatWbBQE&list=PLtbcZsZIvZdLsfTzbDJ0g3GRf9scVz599

A related issue: Many non-speaking people deal with having their speech devices taken away from them in hospital and police settings. It's absolutely critical that a non-speaking person has full access to their speech device at all times but some people just see them as "toys" and remove them. Awful, awful thing to do.

I went into hospital for a planned operation. Just before I was due to go down to theatre, I put a large laminated sign on my wheelchair stating it was personal property, and bike locked it to the armchair in my room!

When my daughter gave birth the first time, I was her birthing coach. The nurses tried to take my manual chair because they needed it for another mother. Possibly because I had "stood," leaning on the side of her hospital bed to hold onto her, in the final stages.

This happened to me. The ambulance team assured me the hospital would have one to borrow whilst I was in hospital. I spent twelve days confined to a bed. As there were no spare wheelchairs in the hospital. Was not a good experience.

This is why I refuse to leave my wheelchair unsupervised in public. I don't care how inconvenient it is, I don't want someone to mess with it. My chair cost a lot of money and if I lose it, I'm screwed.

As an EMT (in the US), there are actually two things we are concerned with when transporting mobility aids. The minor one is loss of or damage to the mobility aid. Far more important is the (at least here) legal requirement that all objects in the ambulance must be strapped down while the vehicle is moving in case of accident -- a flying object in the back of an ambulance can kill occupants, and the larger and heavier it is the higher the risk. None of the ambulances I work on have the means to strap down a power wheelchair safely. Therefore, it would be considered my fault if I were to transport a patient with that wheelchair and any occupant of the ambulance were to be injured by said device. I regularly use extra seatbelts or similar to strap down walkers, rollators, etc., and if a wheelchair folds I can also strap it down easily enough in most ambulances. Even a manual non-folding wheelchair may be manageable. I place canes on the stretcher with the patient and strap it down with them. I understand the need for people to have their mobility aids. But if transporting a mobility aid could potentially lose me my certification, that will mean I can never help anyone again. Yes, ambulances should have ways to fasten these devices safely. However, also consider that a power wheelchair is much bigger than a manual one and it would be hard to find the physical space to do so as well. We would need to have larger ambulances to accommodate these devices. When I can, I bring the device. But some devices won't fit safely in a way that can be strapped down and thus are hazards when the ambulance is in motion. Ultimately, my goal is to get you where you are going safely. Sometimes I cannot do that and also bring your large mobility device.

I've experienced this as well while in the hospital. I am a wheelchair user also. I understand hospitals have to make sure that you are able to operate your mobility aide safely : especially, if you've had a stroke or something. However, I was ill and had not had a stroke but they confined me to bed. It was very scary 😢 as well as dehumanizing. My autonomy was denied. I was very angry too. I was not able to voice my desires. I was too ill. Since I used to be able to walk, I had a hard time convincing the staff that I no longer was able to walk. I am not a small person and I believe that also had a part in the care I received... Left for most of shifts w/o contact or help.

When I took my children and husband to see Disney on ice last year. I told them on the phone,I use a wheelchair and I didn't need a wheelchair seat because I can walk a small distance, and I'd have been separated from my family and had to pay extra for the Privilege. So I said with support I can walk down 2 steps to a regular seat. What they didn't tell me was I wouldn't be allowed to keep my wheelchair near by. I had to take it to 'wheelchair storage' at the literal other side of the arena. (or at least my husband had to because I can't walk that far). I was the only one in my seating area that needed a wheelchair but didn't stay sitting in it, so there was loads of room 2 rows back (on the main concourse) to keep my wheelchair near me and not in the way. When I asked what do I do if I need the toilet during the performance or if there's a fire? and they said, you'll have to wait until the interval and go get it because wheelchair storage isn't manned during performances. All this was found out just before the show started, when we sat in our seats, so I felt I had no choice but to oblige. If they'd have told me on the phone when I booked tickets, that was the case, I maybe wouldn't have booked at that particular arena. All I can say is I'm glad my kids had fun and I have a fairly big bladder or I think I'd have 'walked' out and lost £250. I'm certainly not doing it again in a hurry.

So this actually did happen to me. I had a kidney stone one semester when I was living at my college in my dorm and they called 911 for me took me away and an ambulance and I told them I was a wheelchair user and that I needed to take my wheelchair now I normally use a power chair, but I did have a manual one in the lobby of my dorm just sitting there. and it’s completely foldable like everything folds, including the back and I have it as a back up wheelchair when I can’t use my power chair when the EMTs got there I let them know I was Wheelchair user and I asked them if they would take my wheelchair and they refused and asked Security to bring it which campus Security actually also refused so I was taken to the hospital and they told me in the ambulance, they would tell the charge nurse that I was a wheelchair user and that I had no ability to walk at all unfortunately I was brought in right before the shift change so they told the nurse at the time that I was a wheelchair user but no one told the next shift that I could not walk they also denied me my service animal in the ER as well and they refused to take him in the ambulance which luckily my best friend was like I will hold onto him while you go to the ER although I understand that now I was in severe pain and I could not move so I wasn’t really mad about that but just explaining the level of assistance that I need when they brought me in, they did set a hospital wheelchair next to my bed but because the new staff didn’t know that I could not walk at all they actually took that chair to use for another patient so I was getting up. It wasn’t until the patient said screaming in severe pain. She really has to use the bathroom. She’s been screaming for a while. Why aren’t you guys paying attention and the nurses came in and said well why didn’t you get up and tell us you were in pain and I said I’m a full-time Wheelchair user I cannot get up on my own and they’re like why weren’t we told this and I’m like I don’t know I told EMTs, and then they asked me where my wheelchair was and I told them the EMT denied my wheelchair so I was stuck in a bed for hours on end with no way of getting up or down if I needed it and almost peed myself because the nurse weren’t paying attention luckily when I was just charged about a couple hours later campus, Security did bring me a wheelchair when they came to pick me up because I also cannot drive or I would’ve taken myself but Wheelchair did not have a seatbelt and they took me back on a bus and they did not tie it down so I was very scared. Something was gonna happen to me and I was also ignored because I have CP so I have frequent muscle spasms, and the staff had basically made up their mind that what was wrong with me was just a spasm and I needed to calm downafter CAT scans it was revealed that I actually had a very severe kidney stone and they were denying me pain medication for the 5 1/2 hours. I was there because they were convinced it was a spasm and then it would pass obviously I also asked to speak to whoever was in charge of the ER that night and they were extremely apologetic. They said that the previous team that was on staff neglected to tell them that I was a Wheelchair user and that I was nonambulatory, and it wasn’t even written down in my chart and they don’t normally do stuff like this, and they were extremely sorry that their staff was ignoring me basically the entire night, and the reason Camp denied Wheelchair because they have Wheelchair at the hospital. You don’t need to bring yours, but this kind of highlights why I did to bring my own because if they had seen a custom wheelchair, they would’ve known that I was a Wheelchair user I also spoke to the head of campus security and was told that this would never happen again and that they would insist on bringing my wheelchair up if anything like this were to happen again because like I said it’s Wheelchair that folds all the way down to the floor. It’s very small it would not have been hard for them to bring it, and the head of campus Security was really apologetic as well but here’s where it really becomes interesting about a week later my roommate had a gallbladder stone and also had to be transported via ambulance to the ER and also uses a wheelchair I called campus security because that was procedure for them to call 911 for you. You couldn’t call yourself to the school. They came by they recognize me and I said my roommate needs to go to the hospital, but I wanna let you know that she uses a wheelchair and you have to make sure the EMTs take her wheelchair. If you don’t she will be left in bed unattended and no one will check in on her because they have no way of knowing she’s in a wheelchair now head of campus security wasn’t on call that night so the supervisor for campus. Security shows up instead and tells me that she’s gonna be laying in a bed so it doesn’t matter if we bring her Wheelchair it’s not that big a deal and I explained to her my experience and I said if you don’t, I will be calling the police because you were denying our civil rights, and the EMTs I told them how her chair folds. I helped them disassemble it for her and they took it, but I don’t think this should be much of a fight, considering how much we rely on those and it’s incredibly dangerous because hospital staff have no way of knowing you use a wheelchair unless they see it and things can go wrong so I really think it needs to be common practice that EMTs bring someone’s medical aid if they requested and if it’s capable of being with them, I understand if it’s a power assist, it may not be able to be brought, but manual absolutely should be by the way the supervisor that told my roommate that she didn’t need her chair because she was gonna be laying in bed the whole time anyway she ran into my mom the next semester when I had to use my manual chair for a week because I was getting my new power chair and I couldn’t bring both in my car and have the space for the new one and as we were unpacking, my mom goes back down to get one of my suitcases and the fire alarm goes off so she goes up to the public safety officer that’s leading the evacuation and tries to go back in she stops my mom andshe says my daughter is upstairs. I need to get to her can you tell me if this is a real emergency or if it’s just a drill she rudely tells my mother that she doesn’t need to know that information then my mom yells yes I do. She’s in a wheelchair. She’s on the fourth floor the elevators are shut down she’s panicking because she cannot push her wheelchair by herself, she told you guys she would be in for the first 24 hours after moving by email. I need to get up there and if you don’t let me up there, I’m gonna call the dean of students and the head of the university and then finally she was up there. She actually let go from her job because of the way she acted towards me and my mother, and this was the same woman that denied both me and my roommate our chairs so naturally after hearing this, the university was horrified and suspended her and then fired her. Sorry for not using period I use voice to text and it will not let me unless it decides to unfortunately irks anybody I apologize

Back in my EMS days, nearly 35 years ago, we had a call with someone with a power chair. There was really no way we could have put that into the ambulance, but being a company that also had wheelchair vans (I loved working the wheelchair vans!), we dispatched one of out wheelchair vans to go pick up the chair and bring it to the hospital. I suspect that most ambulance services have wheelchair vans and should 100% provide this service. It is not realistic to expect an ambulance crew to load a power chair into an ambulance. A manual chair, that's a different story.

While not a mobility aid- I’ve had people (mostly teachers) grab and take my noise canceling headphones. Because obviously I’m using them to listen to music instead of toning down the sound because of my severe sensory processing disorder. 🙄 I’ve long since graduated from schooling but I still to this day, get very nervous and protective of my headphones whenever someone dares reach towards them.

Just watching this as I had sepsis back in January, and pneumonia as well as kidney infection and the ambulance didn’t want to take my wheelchair. I refused to go if I wasn’t allowed my chair, and the paramedics were lovely and said I needed hospital so they brought my chair x I was in bed for a while and unable to get up because I was so sick, but definitely was so glad I had my chair there x

Medical PTSD is already a thing most of us can relate to. Add panic attacks at the loss of your freedom tools, and it is an absolute nightmare THAT DOESN'T NEED TO HAPPEN!

When you talked about people having chairs or other aids taken away at a theatre I want to share my experience. I have worked Front of House at multiple theatres for many years, and I have been disgusted that we were always trained to leave anyone with mobility issues in the building during evacuations. There was no plan in place to even return their aids before we left them. This causes me so much anxiety whenever I have to use a chair. It is terrifying.

I'm in Bristol, UK. Ambulances won't take my powerchair or small folding wheelchair. The last time I used an ambulance (allergic reaction) I hadto phone my friend who left work early to detour to mine, pick up the folding wheelchair, then come to collect me to take me home. I recently had an MRI appt. I use hospital transport, but they've changed the rules and will no longer take my chair. This meant I hadto use the hospital's attendant chairs and rely on strangers to push me around. Not only is it humiliating to haveto ask for help reaching the toilet, but I also have PTSD, both hospitals and being pushed by strangers me are triggers. I was only at the hospital for less than 3 hours, but it took a week to recover to the point I could leave my home again.

I have this issue with family members frequently moving my mobility aids "out the way". When I point out i cant reach my aid I get a dismissive "thats okay I can get it for you when you want it" I cant seem to get them to understand how vulnerable and anxious not being able to reach my aids independently makes me feel. When I've tried to explain in the past my mother told me not to "become an awkward disabled person"

I work as an usher at an arena and I have had times when people in wheelchairs have tickets for seats and not in the ADA seating. So the person with them helps them down the stairs and I put the wheelchair out of the way of other people. I always tell the person that if they need the chair just tell me and I will get it. We can't have thing in the aisleways because it's a fire hazard. The aisleways must be clear. But I always make sure to tell the person where I am moving it too and that I will get it for them when they need it.

I have had my chair broken in hospital because it was manhandled by staff So when in a different hospital rule number one don’t touch my chair it wasn’t broken at second hospital

I feel so lucky with my experience in hospital with my walker and with crutches/walking sticks. Everytime the staff have been great about accommodating me and making sure that not only were my possessions - including mobility aids - were with me at all times. To the extent that some staff have gone out of their way to help me with them (e.g. carrying/moving them, putting them in the bed with me for transportation so I knew where they were. I do have 2 very good hospitals that I frequent, but I can tell the increasing cuts to the Ñhș budget are taking their toll on things like this. No one has the time and energy to help you if you're if higher needs, and for 99.9% of the time.