Seatara BathMobile travel shower commode chair

[elarson]

I've seen some of the older posts about the Seatara WheelAble and saw that later (2019) they came out with the BathMobile www.seatara.com/products/indoors-shower-and-commode-chair. From what I can see, the BathMobile has some features that might make it more usable for people with paralysis or hemiparesis, such as detachable swing-away foot rests and a recess that can be rotated. It also has push up folding arm rests, 3 height adjustments and it's very light weight at about 10kg/22 lbs. There is also a self-propelling option with 24 inchwheels. It requires no tools to setup.

We have a Nuprodx chair, which we really like for home use, but I'm getting tired of lugging it around when we travel. We will keep the Nuprodx as the everyday shower chair and only use the BathMobile when traveling, as I'm not sure it could handle everyday wear and tear. We have just ordered one and it should arrive shortly. If anyone is interesting in knowing more, let me know and I can give a review.

BTW, I've been confused with this product name, because here in the Netherlands it goes by the name Careline Juno.

[elarson]

We received the Seatara BathMobile shower chair today. Overall, we are really pleased with it. The design is very good and the plastic parts fit together well and have locking mechanisms where needed. I didn't struggle at all putting it together and was able to put it together in 5 minutes. See video Bathmobile assembly.

The only adjustment I needed to make was to lower the footrest. There are 4 footrest adjustment points of 3 cm each. The lowest position worked fine for my 184 cm / 6 foot husband, and possibly we will raise it a bit. That is the only adjustment that required a tool -- a hex wrench, which they supplied, and should only be needed on initial setup.

The chair fits over our Geberit AquaClean Mera shower toilet that is 40 cm wide and about 43 cm high. The specs say the Floor to Seat Height without the commode pan and rails is 45 cm / 17.5", but I have not been able to test it because I've struggled getting the 5" casters loose, but hopefully I'll figure that out.

It has a keyhole recess/cutout that is rather large. Ours came with a round commode pan and rails that were also easy to install and remove. We probably will only use them when we encounter a difficult toilet.
Everything looks solidly made as possible from reinforced plastic and it rolls very well. The seat is very hard. They have a few options for polyurethane padded seat cushions, which we will probably be ordering one after I figure out how to source it.
The only exposed metal parts are the screws for adjusting the footrest and the screws in the hinge in front. All screws are stainless steel, and should be easy to replace if needed.

My husband has pretty heavy hemiparesis and we do assisted transfers. For us the chair will work because I can raise the armrests and remove the footrest on the side he is transferring from. I "think" it would work for a para who has some hand dexterity, but help might be needed on the initial setup. My husband usually puts quite a lot of body weight on the armrests, and it’s clear that we will need to be careful about doing that.

I did struggle a bit on disassembly and had to be careful not to get pinched. When they show in the illustrated user manual to flip the chair over to adjust the casters or turn it on it's back to take the back off, it's important to do it or it's really tough. I found that things loosened up a little after a few tries and am glad I practiced in advance of traveling when it might be needed quickly.

I just hope that the parts don't loosen too much with wear and tear, or even worse, melt in hot weather. The documentation says “Keep away from sunlight" and “to store the commode and shower chair in dry conditions with ambient temperature: 0 – 40°C / 104°F". They are also are very clear about this being only an “indoor product". The users manual also shows all the chair's part numbers, which I assume can be replaced if damaged.

One of the distributors describes the use in the way we plan to use it "Bathmobile is appropriate for occasional usage as a portable toilet and shower chair". The user manual says "The expected lifetime of the commode and shower chair when properly used and maintained is up to 4 years". We will use it about 3 weeks a year and only when traveling or as a backup shower chair.

This is the 6th or 7th toilet and shower chair that we have used, and I think those are accurate descriptions, but am hoping that we can get more than 4 years out of it. After looking for 14 years, I think this is about the only one on the market that is this light weight and portable and made of materials that won’t rust. Until we can get a foldable travel shower chair made of carbon fiber under €500, I think this will do.
We didn't want to order their wheeled travel case, and we also could not find a place to source it. Instead we ordered a Samsonite 4-wheel hard sided spinner suitcase, that I am hoping it will "just" fit into, and be stronger than what their case looks to be. Hopefully there will also be room to pack some clothes around it so it doesn't get bashed up. I'll give an update on if it fits after we get it.

Seatara is an Israeli company that sells as an OEM to a distributor Careline out of Germany in western Europe under the name Juno. The box and product are clearly labeled as the BathMobile. We purchased the chair it in the Netherlands for €369 from Rehashop, which I think is the Careline webshop for Germany, Netherlands, France, and perhaps other countries.

Having searched the websites in many countries, it looks like different distributors use different names and offer different options and use different part numbers -- see photo of the box of all available options and the Seatara part numbers. I don't know why they rebrand products like this, because it makes it very confusing and hard to find them and compare prices in different countries.

I saw it at RehabMart in the US for $550 and it looks like they offer all the options: https://www.rehabmart.com/product/se...air-48374.html. I also saw it on Amazon, but all Amazon countries show it as out of stock, as it appears to be in many countries on other online shops also.

Most online shops do not offer returns on hygiene items. If anyone has any questions I'd be happy to try to help.

Here are some photo's of the BathMobile, alone with one that shows it next to our Nuprodx everyday shower chair.

[SCI-Nurse]

Can it be adjusted in height so that he or a caregiver can get their hand between the toilet bowl and seat to do dig stim, manual removal, or clean up? Having the opening in the seat only in the front makes that difficult.

Also, as medical equipment it does not count if you check it on airlines against your baggage limit (no extra fee), unless you put non-medical equipment or clothing in the same bag. Try to pad it if needed with bed incontinence pads or other soft medical supplies if needed.

(KLD)

[elarson]

I'm not sure why, but KLD's comment/question seems to have disappeared.

Can it be adjusted in height so that he or a caregiver can get their hand between the toilet bowl and seat to do dig stim, manual removal, or clean up? Having the opening in the seat only in the front makes that difficult.

Also, as medical equipment it does not count if you check it on airlines against your baggage limit (no extra fee), unless you put non-medical equipment or clothing in the same bag. Try to pad it if needed with bed incontinence pads or other soft medical supplies if needed.

(KLD)

Thanks for the heads-up about medical equipment baggage. We have always gotten away with padding with clothing, but these days you never know. To answer KLD’s question, the height can be adjusted so that a caregiver can get their hand between the toilet bowl and seat, but it depends on the height of the toilet.

I managed to get the casters loose to adjust the height -- I have a sprained wrist, so that did not help. Although they were difficult the first time, they were easier after that. How they did the casters was rather ingenious with channels on the stem for different heights. This video shows How to adjust Bathmobile 3 different heights. I found that placing my foot on the frame gave me the leverage I needed the first time. After that they easily clicked in and out.

It has 3 height adjustments – high, mid, low. The specs say the “Floor to Seat Height” without the commode pan and rails is 45 cm / 17.5". It is actually a little higher when I measured from the floor to the bottom of the seat frame at different locations. The front, where the hinge is, is 2 cm higher than the back, and the back is 2 cm higher than the sides. The seat can be rotated to the front, where the hinge is, or the back as shown in these photos with the measurements:

This photo is from the side with it adjusted to “high” so you can see the possible access:

Having now taken it apart and put it back together and adjusted a few times, I am very impressed with the design and the quality of manufacturing of the shower chair. The chair was designed and engineered by a sister and brother team and it is clear that a lot of thought went into incorporating the most important features in rather novel ways, making the parts fit well, making it really light and transportable, and making it easy to assemble and clean. For example, it has embossed labels for parts like front and the height adjustments (I hate adhesive labels that come off and get grungy) and there are no plastic shards to get cut on. This is definitely not a cheap knock-off that has been outsourced abroad. If you are curious, this is the patent USD873183S1 that shows CAD drawings. I'll be looking forward to seeing what else they come up with (no, I have no affiliation).

Seatara Medical is a division of Zriha Hlavin Industries www.zriha.com who do design and produce plastic injection molds and parts. I was able to contact them through their website, by phone and per e-mail and they were sufficiently responsive. I don’t think they do any direct sales and use a distributor/reseller model exclusively. I talked to a few resellers about why the BathMobile and options are hard to find and it sounds like it’s been due to production or delivery delays, rather than any issues with the chairs. Hopefully that will improve with time.

[elarson]

These photos show the keyhole recess/cutout and the rails for the commode pan:

[miltongm09]

Are the arms sturdy? I am not a big individual but put my weight on the left arm specifically. I assume the back is sturdy.

[elarson]

Are the arms sturdy? I am not a big individual but put my weight on the left arm specifically. I assume the back is sturdy.

My husband also puts a lot of weight on the arm rests. They were quite sturdy when we tested it. And yes, the back is very sturdy.

[elarson]

We tried to pack the chair in a hard sided spinner suitcase (size large). Unfortunately, the design did not work so well because it had molded recesses for the wheels and handle that made it impossible to fit the back, which is the largest part. The hard sided case when open is split laterally with and equal depth for the top and the bottom. That also made it difficult to pack all of the parts without them falling out -- the frame is the deepest part. Possibly if we bought a size extra-large hard sided case it would all fit, but that is bulkier than what we want to travel with.


Luckily we have an old large soft sided spinner case that does not have the recesses and when open is split laterally with a lot of depth in the bottom to set all the parts into. This is similar to what I could see on the Seatara website for how their Carrying Case is designed.


I found the round removable pan that was delivered to be too bulky for travel. I ordered a cheap foldable basket that is similar in dimensions to the square removable pan from Seatara. We hope not to need to use it, because we think the chair is adjustable enough for most toilets. Until it is used it will do double duty as a carrying basket. We are still waiting on the 16mm Opened Padded Seat, because I had to source it in another country.

[elarson]

We received the 16mm Opened Padded Seat. It's a very high density polyurethane foam -- almost like rubber and rather hard. I'm not sure it would be comfortable enough for some users, but will probably be okay for my husband for traveling. It's also very heavy and weighs about 1.2 kg / 2.6 lbs. They have a 50mm Opened Padded Seat, but if it is the same high density PU foam I can imagine it would be at least double the weight, and also pretty hard.

[miltongm09]

Thanks for all the info. I have ordered one. It looks like it may work for travel. I did not order the padded seat. I have a much softer and lighter one that should work.