Ideas for making a floor 'safer'

daska

Mum is coming out of hospital and will be living in the 'garden room' which is sort of half room/ half conservatory. At the moment the room looks great with a lovely tiled floor but mum has dementia (she is already verbally aggressive and we expect she will need to go into a home quite soon), severely impaired mobility and doesn't appear to be too bothered about getting to the toilet - nurses say at least one major clean up job per day.

While it seems daft to invest money in reducing the saleability/value of the property her safety is paramount and the existing tiled floor isn't going to fit the bill but it's a large area and money is tight so... any ideas? obvious pitfalls? lateral thinking?

The room is about 22' x 18'. Any ideas on flooring that (ideally)
a. won't wreck the tiles underneath
b. will be easy to clean after the inevitable 'accidents'.
c. will be less dangerous in the case of a fall

honeypop

How about laying something like this on the floor? Not from here specifically but it was the first site I found with a photo of what I wanted to show you. You can get them cheaper if you look around.

We have multicoloured ones that we laid down for my son when he started walking, and they tick all 3 of your requirements, but the ones in a wood effect would probably look better!

And you needn't cover the whole floor, just the exposed pieces to save money, so don't bother with under the furniture perhaps.

daska

Brilliant idea. Thank you. They look like a definite possibility. How are they for cleaning though, would the wee seep through? And how easy would they be for someone to trip on the edge - especially if shuffling?

honeypop

They come with some 'edges' which is a strip with a slight slope to them, that you just fix all round the edge of the area covered. I know a toddler walking is different to a more elderly person, but when he wasn't picking his feet up very much, he still didn't trip on the edge due to the sloping bit, so I would assume she would be ok.

For cleaning, spilt drinks didn't seem to seep through and cleaned up nicely.

The cheapest I found mine was on ebay, and with most places the more you order the cheaper they are. Perhaps you could order one set of 4 just to see what they are like and to check suitability before laying out a whole floor? I would assume most places would accept a return of them if unsuitable.

julianashcroft

If you are worried about the tiled floor being slippy, you can treat it to make it grip more. I have used one type (cant remember the name as it was agood few years ago) on a kitchen floor and it did work well. It was a type of acid that ate very slightly into the surface of the tile to create the grip. Didn't alter how they looked and cleaning was just as easy. Grip is meant to improve when the floor is wet.

Just found it, we used this: http://www.rocol.com/corp/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=201&Itemid=222

ormus

incontinence pads might be a far better solution.

honeypop

ormus wrote: »

incontinence pads might be a far better solution.

For the toilet accidents, probably yes, but how is that going to make the floor less dangerous in the case of a fall, as mentioned in the OP?

daska

ormus wrote: »

incontinence pads might be a far better solution.

Already in use for some time but we still have to cope with when she doesn't quite make it to the commode in time (assuming she even bothers), when she removes them (she doesn't have all her marbles any more), when they don't quite cope with the flow (IBS, shortened bowel etc) etc. (The major clean ups the nurses are having to deal with are with her using pads.)

daska

julianashcroft wrote: »

If you are worried about the tiled floor being slippy, you can treat it to make it grip more. I have used one type (cant remember the name as it was agood few years ago) on a kitchen floor and it did work well. It was a type of acid that ate very slightly into the surface of the tile to create the grip. Didn't alter how they looked and cleaning was just as easy. Grip is meant to improve when the floor is wet.

Just found it, we used this: http://www.rocol.com/corp/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=201&Itemid=222

Thank you for that suggestion, for this situation we really need something that will lessen the danger of her breaking something if she falls BUT... it's perfect for another area that we hadn't tackled yet so I'll be hunting some down! Brilliant.

julianashcroft

How about this then: http://www.softfloor.co.uk/

daska

julianashcroft wrote: »

How about this then: http://www.softfloor.co.uk/

Yes, that's very similar to Marcy's suggestion, so far it's looking very much the best option. We need to trundle off and take a look and appointments keep getting in the way LOL. Thank you