TABLE 2—

Wheelchair Users’ Difficulties Transferring Into a Dental Chair: Montreal, Québec, Canada, 2011–2012

Issues	Participant Quotations
Excessive height of the dental chair. The lowest level of the chair was still too high and made participants’ transfer difficult.	“I found their chairs could [should] move up and down a bit lower because even with the manual chair, you still need help for transfer . . . from what I can remember you have to stand because it’s still a couple of inches you have to get bumped [lifted] up there.” (interviewee 8)
	“Coming back on the wheelchair was more challenging, because it’s lower and the position of the feet is . . . in an angle, so all those factors made it more difficult to get back on the chair.” (interviewee 7)
Obtrusive position of the dental chair arm. The arms of some dental chairs did not slide and impeded participants’ installation.	“The arm couldn’t come off, so they had to lift me, help me transfer.” (interviewee 1)
Lack of supportive devices. The dental chairs lacked bars and handles to facilitate transfer.	“On the chair of the dentist you don’t have support; you don’t have anchors, guiding bars.” (interviewee 9)
Chair covering. Participants could not install themselves in the chair because of fabrics not conducive to transfers, such as sticky leather.	“Sometimes it’s all leather and leather doesn’t slide, so it’s very difficult to go from my chair to the leather that is very sticky.” (interviewee 2)
Dental staff lack of skills. The staff lacked skills on lifting techniques, manual transfer of the participants, and removing the electric wheelchair from the examination room once the transfer was done.	“As much as the dentist that I have is really, really nice and really accommodating, they definitely don’t know anything about people with disabilities. They do their best; they’re very open-minded, but they obviously never had any training or any real understanding of the real situation, so they have to ask many questions.” (interviewee 5)
	“We need to transfer me with 2 people and so they wanted me to bring somebody to do the top so that’s the heaviest part to lift and just have to transfer.” (interviewee 5)
	“They try to take the chair out of the space, but they can’t because they don’t know how to. . . . They are not used to working with the chair, so it’s not easy. It’s not easy for them; it’s not easy for me.” (interviewee 2)