Design Guidelines for Bathrooms & Other Sanitary Facilities for Elderly and Disabled People

It is a well known fact of modern world that the demographic changes worldwide have by and large resulted in a population that is relatively more older and unfortunately more disabled than many may realize or estimate.

As the NC State University rightly points out--- People are living longer today. The average lifespan has increased to 76 now as against 47 a couple of decades back, largely due to healthier living, better medical facilities and sanitation that have virtually eliminated many killer infectious diseases. Nearly 80% of the population now lives past the age of 65. Moreover, more & more people are now living with disability resulted to them naturally or due to old age, victimization, accidents, diseases, etc.

So what are we doing about this issue?
Are today's town & building planners, architects, engineers, etc. still adequately educated and practically oriented to know adequately about the needs of the disabled, aged and challenged people with respect to design elements required in buildings, places, roads, walkways, etc. etc.?

This topic today came to our mind while reading about some aged and disabled person who questioned over a tweet why don't the everyday-use building elements like the toilets and bathrooms be customized as per their needs and comfort? And, we all pondered what better should the technical professionals in the building & construction fields do to really help the elderly and disabled people.

Post a discussion we all had for about an hour or so, we realized we really do not know the very requirements of an aged and/or a disabled person that he/she may require in his/her home, office and other public buildings. A little web surfing in this subject made us realize there are certain guidelines and design standards that some of the organizations and/or companies around the world have chalked out, which the town planners, architects and engineers can refer to.

A set of one such useful guidelines/ specifications/ illustrations that we could find on the world wide web, which is adopted in the United States of America and elsewhere too, is the "Accessibility Planning Guide for Bathrooms -- Regulations | Universal Design" (click this link to access the entire PDF file). The PDF document states that it is 'a planning guide for architectural specifiers, interior designers, building owners, building contractors, facility managers, home owners and anyone interested in bathroom design'.

And, since we found it very useful, we thought it better to share with all the readers and subscribers of bricksnmortar as well. Hope you all shall read it and the town & building planners, architects, engineers, enthusiasts, interested home owners among you shall utilize the good information to design better and user-friendly bathrooms for one and all... physically healthy, disabled or aged alike.

To conclude this part of the post, we must put forward this disclaimer as well that though the link is furnished from a brand manufacturer's website, bricks-n-mortar. com has in no way used and shared this information in lieu of any monetary and/or other benefit at all. The information is shared on as is, where is basis for the purpose of sharing knowledge and useful information only. We further envisage to come out with similar posts on other aspects of building design (other than bathrooms) that shall cater to the elderly and challenged people. You, our readers, are also advised to pool-in any good information in this regard.

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Link of use:
Accessibility Planning Guide for Bathrooms -- Regulations | Universal Design
Image sources:
japan-accessible.com  &  hafele.com

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