When Older Adults Face the Chair‐Rise Challenge: A Study of Chair Height Availability and Height‐Modified Chair‐Rise Performance in the Elderly

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Abstract
Define the range of community seating heights available for use by older adults; test whether raising chair height by small increments facilitates chair-rise performance; and heighten physician and furniture industry awareness of discrepancies that may exist between actual and acceptable chair heights for older adults. Phase 1: Survey of commercially available chair heights. Phase 2: Cross-sectional descriptive study of chair-rise ability. Phase 1: Local furniture stores, physician offices, hospital waiting areas, and nursing homes. Phase 2: Postural Control Lab. Twenty-two volunteers (nursing home residents and community dwellers). inability to stand independently and inability to bear full weight on the lower extremities in the standing position. Chair rise success at six heights (17-22 inches), self-reported difficulty (visual analogue scale), change in minimum hip angle and maximum shoulder angle during rise, using motion analysis. Phase 1: Community chair heights ranged from 12 to 18 inches, with a mean of 16.3 in physician offices, 16.6 in nursing homes, 16.4 in hospitals, 17.3 in "kitchens" and 15 in "living rooms." Phase 2: As chair height increased from 17 to 22 inches, chair rise effort decreased, as shown by near doubling of percent successful rises, decline in mean self-reported difficulty score, increase in mean minimum hip angle, and decrease in mean maximum shoulder angle. Seating height may need to be more closely scrutinized in areas frequented by frail elders. Augmentation of seat height by small increments facilitates chair rise performance.

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