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bath layout/shower size/aging in place

10 years ago

--my first posting.
--thanks to all you intelligent and not overly showy people. have found great info on GW.
--am posting photo of totally gutted dilapidated house just to set the tone
- bathroom for 1 aging person is roughly 7 ' by 8'.
--tiled shower: corner or rectangle? will not do door, prefer curtain.
--any all advice appreciated.

thanks very much!

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Comments (8)

tibbrix
10 years ago
Can you put a pic of the room up?
debrak2008
10 years ago
Here is a link to a thread on aging in place bathrooms.

Here is a link that might be useful: aging in place bathrooms
Related Discussions
Floor Plan - tips on aging in place?
Q
Comments (10)
The only entrance to the master suite is allll the way at the back of a rather large house. I'd consider a second entrance nearer the closet /bath end. I suspect this would be convenient quite often. Since you're talking about aging in place, a toilet in a closet is impractical. Tuck it behind a door or behind the shower, but allow yourself the space you'll need to navigate the area. I would open up the pantry to be a part of the mudroom. This means that when you enter the house with groceries, you're set to put things away. I don't see laundry anywhere? You have a large, space-hogging set of stairs . . . but they're tucked away. These lovely and expensive stairs make sense, if you're showcasing them in your entry or on the edge of your family room, but if you're tucking the staircase away to the edge, I'd go with the less expensive, less space-hogging straight stairs. Also, if you are going with these stairs, at least harnass the space underneath them. You have probably 4 or 5x8' of half-height space, which could be storage open towards the garage . . . or a built-in desk or shelves open towards the office. I would not block off this space! If you stick with this staircase, definitely add a window on the landing. You don't want people navigating the stairway in the dark. Both of your showers look narrow-skinny. Your kitchen aisle looks rather narrow-skinny too. In the secondary bedroom, if you move the closet to the bathroom wall, you'll insulate that room against bathroom sounds . . . and I think you'll get a larger closet. You'll also have a bit of an "alcove" as you enter the room, which is nice. Reaching this secondary bedroom is a long walk. I'd consider a door near the kitchen. If you (or another owner) ever needed to use the office as a bedroom, this would be a better option. I'm not a fan of over-sized garages, but I see a problem with this one: The opening closest to the house, I'm not sure you can pull into it. I think the front stairs might prevent you from making that turn. Will your middle garage door allow a large vehicle (i.e., handicapped van) to enter?
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'Aging in place' considerations - are they effective?
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Comments (25)
Prairie, You're right that so many services are available to the elderly -- yet a lot of people don't investigate their availability /won't use them. My grandmother, for example, welcomed Meals on Wheels but balked at calling the county's handicapped /elderly transportation van. Public transportation? That's for poor people! One of the reasons I'm pretty much sold on a certain building lot is that the neighborhood is connected to the town's "city center", which includes the town's senior center, the library and a pharmacy. We'd be able to walk (or golf cart) to these places without getting out on the main road. Physical therapy? After a serious illness my grandmother had physical therapy while she was an inpatient at a rehab facility, then she went twice a week to the hospital for some months. It did her a great deal of good. More recently my mother had physical therapy after surgery. Her therapist started her with "in bed exercises". He brought a board to her house, which he slid under her, and she did her exercises lying down. Then they moved on to the kitchen, where he had her exercise while holding onto the counter as a stabilizer. When she was doing her exercises alone, she "cheated" and held onto the sofa back instead so she could watch TV while she exercised. I think my mom was fortunate to get an A++ therapist, and he did her a world of good. Are you asking because you're trying to make sure you plan space enough for exercise in your house? BenjesBride, I don't know that I'd say the toilet is more important than the shower. I think you're more likely to be injured in the shower because of the water /possible slipping .... but you use the toilet more frequently, so you have more opportunities for accidents. Of course, the right answer is to make both as safe as possible! I think my girls' bathroom has a good set-up for an elderly person's toilet, and we're actually copying it for our future house. This is a random internet picture, not my actual house, but it's the layout I'm discussing -- I do like the color scheme and traditional look in this bathroom: The person using the toilet is a bit hidden from view, but the wall and the shorty wall provide plenty of space to anchor grab bars. An assistant could help an elderly person reach this toilet, then retreat a step to allow for some dignity ... without leaving the person completely alone. I'm thinking I want to make the pony wall thicker so it can also hold spare toilet paper. Using the same thought process, we're using solid pony-walls in our shower /glass only on the upper portion. Yes, full glass would look nicer, would make the room look larger, and would allow light to pour into the shower ... but a piece of glass can't support grab bars on both sides of the shower, and I like the idea of having bars all around.
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Master bath layout - enough space between tub and shower?
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Comments (16)
I"m short on time, but wanted to post something that's been swirling in my brain. I think walk in closets are lovely if you have the space, but I just don't think you have the space; I'm pretty confident that the minimum recommended width of a closet is 5'. How about a walk- through closet to your bathroom? My guesstimate is that you could have 6' wide, reach in closets on either side of a 42" hallway. I've seen lots of pictures with a beautiful tub centered under a window and flanked by vanities, so I appreciate that look might be a priority to you. I just moved all that over to the other window. I tucked the toilet and shower around the corner. Depending on the location of the window, you might be able to have a pocket door, but if not, a wall would add a lot of privacy (avoid seeing the reflection of someone on the toilet from the entrance or the rest of the bathroom.) Anyhoo. Here's a rough drawing. If aging in place is a concern, I'd put the shower and toilet on the exterior or bedroom wall, so you have the option of creating a quicker route to the toilet (through the closet wall) in the future.
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Week 121 - Aging in place kitchen planning - did you or didn't you?
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Comments (22)
3z3z3 - a separate post on kitchens would get you more help. if you want to set things up more for handicap/injury use be sure to post that. any of us can get an injury that will cause mobility problems at any time. about 14 yrs ago now (wow... that long ago?) I broke my knee cap. that was painful... and painful to move around. and I'll tell you it was painful to get down/up on/from the toilet. horrible pain. we don't normally realize how much weight / use we need from our hips, thighs, legs to do these normally simple normal life things. when I moved to my new place I did what I could to make things easier for me now and in the future. it started with it having a tubless shower. no more climbing over a tub edge! that's made a world of difference for me! I put in levers on doors and changed a floor (nice one too) that had a too high lip on it from the hallway and DR area. and have plans to change out the bathroom / kit faucets to 1 lever handle. I had some vinyl plank flooring put in cause I do fall frequently (more than normal people) and wanted a softer landing. also, if there's a leak, it'll be easier for me to pull up so subfloor doesn't stay soaked. no cabinet handles with sharp ends and at least a 1.25" projection - also at least 5" long. plenty of room for getting my fingers in/around the handle. the no sharp ends is in case I do fall, nothing sharp to hurt me. I also made sure the place was big enough that I could get around with a walker or wc. I have plans to have 1 lower cabinet changed to drawers in the kitchen (it doesn't have many cabs anyway). I do have a good sized pantry off the side of the kitchen where I could keep more things if necessary. and a ramp is in the back of my mind. unless something rushes it, it'll probably be 2 yrs or so down the road. I have 4 steps in/out any ext doors. I recently bought an AF to use instead of the oven (mostly). some of that is that I'm single and what I use the oven for is usually very little. I also bought a 1 pot cooker (3.5 qt) so I could hopefully use less 'pots' for cooking and not use the stove. this pot will cook something for the time set and then go to 'warm'. if I doze off or forget about it, it won't burn anything up like the stove burner would. I'm also considering an induction hot plate for when I do want/need an actual burner. I think it's less likely to cause a fire than my electric coil stove top burner. I can't remember when I ever had need of more than 1 burner. I lived in the old place 14 yrs with a 1 burner hot plate and survived nicely. Then i'll probably just detach the coils and cover the top - maybe with a piece of SS.
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debrak2008
10 years ago
Here is an even better thread on aging in place ideas not only for the bathroom but the entire house.

Here is a link that might be useful: aging in place
tibbrix
10 years ago
Oops, put it on the wrong thread.

This post was edited by Tibbrix on Fri, Feb 7, 14 at 15:20
Katy60
10 years ago
One thing I kept in mind was leaving clearances that would allow for rolling to the toilet and into the shower. I assumed the ability to stand up and turn. This allows for access by someone using a rolling walker, or seated on a rolling chair of some kind. I didn't worry about full scale wheelchair access as other aspects of my house make that impractical. The significant things were a curbless shower with a 36 inch entrance, and sufficient clearance in front of the toilet (and the path from the door to the toilet) to swing a rolling walker around easily. I also added a half wall so that I could put grab bars on both sides of the toilet. If you don't need grab bars there now, a major re-do lets you easily ensure good blocking for them goes in for the future at pretty much no cost. I have some areas in the shower blocked for additional grab bars if needed in the future (and a diagram showing exactly where the blocking is) Those were my major considerations as I was going through the process.
tibbrix
10 years ago
I think a corner shower is a good idea. Give it a very wide opening which also extends far out, then use an curbed shower rod for the curtain and liner so there is still plenty of room inside the shower. room for a seat for sitting. And I would have two shower heads: one in the usual place, and one lower with a removable hand-held head so if someone is sitting down, they can reach is and use it for showering.

If you put a slight decline on the floor from the entrance to the center/drain, the water will roll down to the drain and not out of the shower, so you wouldn't need a lip to keep the curtains in and the water from spraying out.
gabbythecat
10 years ago
Our shower is 3 1/2 by 5; we do not have a shower curtain or door. Just a low curb. We haven't had any problems with water escaping the shower stall. I think the spray only goes about 2 1/2 feet from the head, which is on the wall opposite the entry (sorry - I don't have a drawing). We have grab bars by the toilet; one of the grab bars also has a tp holder, so it doesn't *look* medical. The toilet is raised...we didn't build the house to be wheelchair accessible, but rather accessible to crutches. I just had a knee replacement 1 1/2 week ago, about a month after we finished building our house and moved in. I don't know what I would've done without the accessible features!!..Oh - we only have one shower head; it is on a sliding bar, which means we have a shower head that is both fixed and at standard height and is also removable.
elleninmaine
Original Author
10 years ago
all great ideas. thank you very much!

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