Exercises in a wheelchair?
If you are a rehabilitation professional and you are looking for ideas of easy exercises to do in wheelchair, take a look at these proposals
Physiotherapists or occupational therapists working with geriatric patients or people with severe disabilities often do not have the time or resources for more individualised care.
It would be ideal to take the patient out of their chair, to work on a stretcher… but this is not always feasible when there is only one professional to care for dozens of users, many with high support needs. Practitioner/patient ratios are very limited.
Let’s look at some easy exercises to do with wheelchair users.
What easy exercises can we work on in a wheelchair?
- Arm-strengthening exercises: light weight lifting, push-ups, elastic band exercises.
- Shoulder mobility exercises: shoulder rotations, lateral raises, arm stretches.
- Lower limb strengthening exercises: isometric contractions, leg raises, resistance exercises with elastic bands or weighted ankle supports. Dorsiflexion of the ankles and pedalling with the aid of static pedals
- Balance and coordination exercises: weight transfers, stability exercises in the wheelchair. For example, you can remove the armrests from the chair to train with trunk lateralisations.
- Seated head control exercises: head and neck movements such as flexion-extension, lateralisation and rotation.
You can introduce more playful elements, such as balls, balloons, group games…
You probably already use these activities in rehabilitation sessions, but you need something more, as it is difficult to keep the attention and motivation of your patients.
Especially when a patient has, in addition to limited mobility, cognitive difficulties, it is difficult to find active exercises in which they can participate.
In this sense, new technologies can be a great help
Can we introduce new technologies with patients in wheelchairs?
New technologies, such as virtual reality headset or even a simple television or computer, are useful elements to turn your rehabilitation sessions into a much more attractive and motivating experience for patients.
We can propose easy exercises to work with virtual reality, whether the patient is sitting or standing.
Gracias a un software de ejercicios físicos con sensor Kinect, cámara web o con gafas de realidad virtual, es posible interactuar con las actividades sólo con el movimiento del cuerpo, sin manejar ningún mando.
This ease of use allows us to work with patients with mobility restrictions, with people with physical or cognitive disabilities.
For example, patients with quadriplegia, cerebral palsy, ataxia, multiple sclerosis, Parkinson’s… could benefit from a virtual exercise programme and work in a much more enjoyable way.
Examples of virtual exercises to be performed with a seated patient
Here are some examples of virtual exercises to be performed with the patient seated in a wheelchair or in a normal chair.
Seated back control: slide on a sled, avoid coconuts thrown by monkeys, catch the flowers, handle a mouse to eat the food that appears on the screen, avoid the jellyfish at the bottom of the sea…
Shoulder joint range: playing floating musical notes, shooting with the movement of your arms, chasing butterflies, breaking boxes, handling tools…
Cephalic control: avoiding bombs, catching objects, handling a skier, destroying asteroids…
Coordination of upper limbs: goal-stopping, swimming exercises, shoulder precision…
These are just a few examples
But there are hundreds of activities available for working with wheelchair and standing patients
