D.C. Woman Feels Free Again With Wheelchair Fixed After 7 Months

A Washington, D.C., woman who couldn't leave her house because of a broken wheelchair said the wheelchair company ignored her calls for months.

Unsteady using her walker, Ann McCombs was afraid to leave her small apartment.

“I was basically homebound,” she said.

Her only means of freedom was her wheelchair, but when it was delivered in March, it was broken. The leg rests wouldn't lock, McCombs said.

McCombs reported the problem to the company that delivered the wheelchair, which is worth almost $3,000, and finally it was picked up June 15. They said they were going to take it to the warehouse and fix it, McCombs said, but the months wore on and the wheelchair company offered very little help.

“The three options that they gave me was wait until it’s fixed, go to another company or take the chair back as it was,” she said.

Unable to leave her house, McCombs said she sat sedentary for so long she was admitted to rehab for a month of physical therapy.

She went as far as seeking legal help.

“They told me that my problem didn’t meet the criteria to handle, so that was that,” she said.

NBC4 Responds reached out to the company, Kamco Medical in Upper Marlboro, Maryland, which said it repeatedly received the wrong leg rest to repair the chair and blamed the delay on Medicare. But the next day, McCombs got her wheelchair back with the legs fixed.

After seven months McCombs has her freedom back.

“I can go to the store, I can do my own grocery shopping … there’s so many places I can go now, I feel free,” she said.