Wheelchair Ramp Frustration

[qtkitty]

Well Joe has been told by his Orthopetic to stay in the wheelchair and use the crutches as needed to move through tight spaces ( AKA the doors at our house )since there will be no surgery unless VNS can control his sezures. Quite frankly our steps are still a hazard. It is hard for me to get his wheelchair in and out of the car let alone up the steps and into the house. Being in my 9th month Joe is upset about me having to lug the wheelchair, Joe's mom has come to help us out for a while and she has back problems so her getting the wheelchair is almost impossible ( plus she isn't supposed to lift more then 5lb but try and tell her that ). Our Neighbor is a fabricator/engineer and had plans for a wheelchair ramp from a prior construction and said we are looking at $1500 worth of just materials to get it installed. No way we can afford that at the moment.

His Orthopetic said that Medicare would pay to have a ramp put in. HAHA tricks on us i guess... cause we called around to DSS( medicaid) which gave us about 7 numbers of organizations that put in ramps. We called all the Organizations some were no longer doing ramps. One was more then happy to put in a ramp, but we had to pay for all the supplies. And the one that upset Joe the most, you don't qualify because you aren't in the age range of the grant. Then when he called Medicare they specifically asked him how old he was and then told him that they wouldn't pay for a wheelchair ramp because it is a convienence item.

We told our landlord that we were looking to get a ramp put in... before we could get anything else out he said that he was not qualified to put one in and that there were several organizations that can put them in. We weren't even hoping that he would actually put in a ramp out of the kindness of his heart, since its not something he has to do by law. Although he has to let us make the changes, but then he could stipulate that it be put back the way it was.

[Laurie in Bradenton]

Try some off the wall groups and see what type of help you can get. Like boy Scouts, local church youth groups and high school shops. Is you hubby a vet? Many vet groups will help out others.
Have you called your local Habatit for Humanity. They may have a resource.
Do you belong to a church? Perhaps your mens group would help you out? How about your moms church? Does the newspaper in your town have a human intrest editior? Get them to do an article on your problem. Have you called your local Homebuilders Assocation. Many do projects like this.
Ask everyone the worst you can be told is no but someone may say yes. You'll never know til you ask.

Laurie in Bradenton

[Holly]

One thing to do first is find out your codes for ramps. They put one in for my brother but didn't have a codes permit and it wasn't up to codes They had to get it redone and inspected by codes
and get a permit.

[qtkitty]

The Code here is that a ramp can be no more then 12:1 ( aka 12 inches for every inch of rise ) if the rise is more then 30 inches then there must be atleast one turn in the ramp turn about space is 5 ft square. There must be a landing at the top and bottom of structure atleast 5 ft X ?. Then there must be railings with the safty code followed for that with the railing having pegs every 2 inches apart to keep children from falling through. Then there must be a lip on the ramp so that the wheels can not get to close to the edge and slip off. And the ramp its self has to be 30inches wide.

Our door is 24 inches from the cement porch. However for the ramp to fit it would have to have one turn around on it and come back on its self.

We called Habitat for Humanity they said that they are not putting in ramps, but that given the situation that we may qualify for a house and that since the amount of applicants for houses in our town at the last application dead line was so low they are going to move up the every 3 months application deadline and may since the deadline was only a week or so ago let Joe send in the paper work and have it go in this application deadline instead of the next. *blinks*

[suki]

Okay, some tips...

I've volunteered with two organizations that did this type of work. One was Kiwanis and the other was Business and Professional Women (yes, girls with tool belts!) So, I agree check any organization in your area to see if they can help.

For materials... get really frugal and creative... call builders and explain to them you are collecting materials to build a ramp for hubby. Ask if you can have their good scrap material from building jobs. I'm telling you, they throw away enough to build the ramp. Call all of them. Even if you get some no's... keep calling. If you get some yes's... keep calling. Soon, you will gather enough material.

Do you have a Home Depot or Lowe's? Call and explain your situation to the manager. They just might want some good PR and to do a good deed.

Otherwise... I hope you qualify for the house.

[leezza]

I hope you get the house also......everyone has given really good idea's, I would add to maybe try the following, (I haven't read in your posts if Joe is a Vet or not?) but even if he isn't you may want to try the following groups.

Amvets
VFW

Other groups that help people are:

Elks
Moose
Shriners
Lions Club

Just some possibilities.
Good Luck,
leezza

[qtkitty]

suki~ thats what i was thinking .. calling builders because i have seen how much they leave behind.. luckily my Uncle was in on building his house and choose correct cuts of wood ect so that he would have as little waste as possible, but normal building sites have a HUGE trash container for waste.



Joe isn't a Vet .. his dad was though but he has since passed away. Joe would have been in the marines if he didn't have sezures. If they knew what they do now when Joe was a child they might have been able to do surgery and take out small peices of his brain before the sezure activity in the brain spread.