8 Helpful Aids for Arthritic Hands to Make Everyday Tasks A Breeze

Arthritic hands can have a big impact on everyday life. With pain, stiffness and swelling around the hands, fingers and wrists, everyday movements like opening bottles and jars or using scissors can be painful, if not impossible. Bending, twisting, and gripping is not easy, which is where an assistive device can help. 

Many Australians with arthritic hands opt for adaptive equipment for arthritis in their hands and fingers, like mechanical jar openers, kitchen aids, dining aids and more. Rather than putting strain on your sore joints, you can bypass the unnecessary pain altogether with a few simple aids for arthritic hands!

Your occupational therapist or healthcare provider may recommend using assistive devices to help perform everyday tasks. Here are some of our top recommended products to simplify common tasks, whether at home or out and about.

#1. one-touch jar and bottle opener

Bottle openers are an excellent tool for people with arthritic hands, providing extra grip, joint protection and leverage that can make opening bottles much easier. Mechanical bottle openers, for example, are designed to help those with limited hand strength or dexterity, as they require less effort than traditional methods of opening a bottle. 

Our one-touch bottle opener automatically opens bottles with the press of a button and can be adjusted to the bottle cap’s size. Plus, thanks to its compact design, this bottle opener can easily be carried around in a purse, handbag or rucksack for quick use when out and about with friends. 

We also stock one-touch jar, tin and can openers to keep in the kitchen, making food preparation simple and pain-free!

#2. Easigrip Scissors

Care Quip’s Easigrip Scissors are ideal for arthritic hands, poor grip, and those with limited wrist movement. The blades are set in plastic handles joined in a lip — this shape allows the handles to spring open again after cutting, making it much simpler to cut paper and food packaging. 

Plus, with a supplied storage holder, there’s no risk of injury when searching through the drawers for scissors!

#3. Kettle Tippers

If you love a hot cup of tea or coffee in the morning, the stylish Uccello Kettle Tipper is guaranteed to impress. Rather than grasping the handle and picking up the kettle to pour a drink, the Uccello Kettle Tipper offers tip-to-pour action — simply tip the handle to effortlessly pour yourself a tea or coffee.

Plus, this kettle is whisper-quiet when boiling and features a water level that’s easy to read when filling up at the tap.

#4. Key Turners

Due to their small size and the torques and twists required to use them, keys can be incredibly difficult to use for people with arthritis. 

Our Double Key Turner can make opening doors much easier. Featuring a built-in plastic handle for better grip and leverage while turning keys, these self-help arthritis devices can hold three keys simultaneously, which can also be folded up and down into the handle. You can open doors in a matter of seconds, pain-free.

#5. Tap Turners

Whether you have severe rheumatoid arthritis or you’re simply having a joint pain flare-up, cross-handle taps can be a real challenge. 

Our collection of adaptive equipment for arthritis in hands and fingers includes Homecraft’s Tapturn Turners, made from strong moulded plastic to hook over existing taps. Supplied in pairs in red and blue, it’s much easier to turn the hot and cold taps on or off with these helpful tap turners. 

Alternatively, we offer Homecraft Crystal Tap Turners, assistive devices with a non-slip rubber lining and a spring-loaded handle to allow the jaws to clamp down on the tap. Perfect for arthritis sufferers, these two tap turners are guaranteed to reduce pain and simplify kitchen and bathroom tasks.

#6. Easy reachers

If you have arthritis beyond your hands (e.g. shoulder joints, wrists, elbows, hips) and need to avoid unnecessary strain while bending or reaching, we recommend opting for an easy reacher. With a full-trigger ergonomic handle, minimal finger extension is required to grab things too high or low to reach.

Our 730mm Easy Reachers (pictured above) even have magnets to retrieve pins and other small metallic objects, no matter where they are.

#7. Button hooks

Managing buttons and zippers can cause unnecessary pain for people with arthritic hands. We offer aids for arthritic hands to minimise pain in the finger joints while dressing — for example, our Kings Button Hook (pictured above).

With a contoured rubber handle for a no-slip grip, this Button Hook allows you to pass the steel wire through the buttonhole, grip the button, and pull it through with a slight twisting motion. Thanks to the shape of the steel wire, you can also hook the wire around your zipper (depending on the size, e.g. a ring pull) and ensure the zipper pulls up or down.

#8. Shoe horns

Flare-ups can make pulling on shoes and socks quite painful, whether in your fingers, wrists, shoulders or hips. The goal is to put less stress on inflamed joints, so we stock shoe horns and other dressing devices! 

We offer shoe horns in chrome and plastic, like the horn pictured above. There’s no need to bend thanks to the long handle, and the horn slips into the heel of your shoe with ease, so you don’t need to struggle pulling on shoes and socks with sore, swollen hands.

Shop these assistive devices for arthritic hands online at Active Mobility!

Arthritis pain can be limiting, but there are assistive and adaptive devices available to make daily tasks easier to manage. Our collection of daily living products and aids for arthritic hands is designed to ease or eliminate the pain of rheumatoid arthritis and promote happy, healthy, and independent living!

Shop arthritis aids online at Active Mobility. We offer flexible payment options like Afterpay and fast shipping Australia-wide!