Who Needs a Changing Places Toilet?
Laura Moore
Mum to William, the coolest kid in town (who happens to have quadraplegic cerebral palsy). Campaigner, blogger, baker and general fixer.
There are many more who require only one or two features in order to be able to have their continence needs met.
So, who are the people who need changing places toilets?
- People with profound and multiple learning disabilities
- People with conditions such as cerebral palsy, multiple sclerosis, motor neurone disease and spina bifida.
- Older people
- Anyone with an acquired brain injury
- Amputees
- Injured servicemen
- Anyone with dementia
- People with any kind of paralysis
- Someone with any kind of muscle wasting disease
- Parents and carers
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Disabled parents
- Anyone needing a clean space for medical reasons
- Someone using a large power chair
- People with colostomy bags or other
- People living with the effects of a stroke
- Someone with autism
These people might need a changing places toilet for a wide variety of reasons including:
- Needing to be hoisted from their wheelchair for their own safety or comfort
- Need to be hoisted from their wheelchair because their carer cannot physically lift them
- Requiring somewhere to lay down to be cleaned and dressed
- Requiring a privacy screen to allow a carer to use the toilet if the person they are looking after is too young or too vulnerable to be left outside the toilet cubicle alone
-
Needing space for more than one carer or for a large wheelchair or powerchair
- Requiring additional space for siblings of a disabled child using the toilet as they cannot be left outside – some families may have 3 or more children to squeeze into the toilet along with the wheelchair and wheelchair user!
- Parents might need a height adjustable changing bench to change their baby or toddler from their wheelchair
- Sensory reasons such as the noise of a hand dryer being set off by another user in a communal bathroom
- Requiring a clean space to change a colostomy bag or similar
- When you consider all these people, and the vast array of reasons they need changing places toilets, it is likely the number of people needing changing places is far higher than estimates suggest.
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