Engineering a Better Life for the Disables
Student projects mean more mobility, greater activity for disabled people
Friday, January 12, 2001
So, they took turns slamming their own fingers between the wooden desktop and its steel frame - first with a 3,500-page book on top, then with a 5-pound weight.
"We just smashed away," Caribardi said, adding that on a pain scale of 1-10, neither of them registered more than 0.45.
Caribardi and Schaffer's project was one of six created by students in this year's Devices for the Disabled class, a senior biomedical engineering seminar in Duke's Pratt School of Engineering. The 12 students in the class spent between 10 and 30 hours a week during the Fall 2000 semester designing and building their projects. In the process, the students gained experience in solving real-world problems, communicating with clients and making ethical decisions about their products.
One of the year's most difficult decisions fell on the shoulders of Brian Alonso and Ethan Fricklas, who built a motorized desk for a high school junior with Duchenne's muscular dystrophy. At the push of a button, a motor slowly raises the clear plastic desk from its stored position behind the client's powered wheelchair.
Before the desk can pass over the client's head, other motors kick in and extend its arms to give it extra clearance. Once the arms are fully extended, the primary motors lower the desk into place in front of the client, giving him the space he needs to eat and do his homework. Although the desk worked perfectly in trials, concerns about its safety and reliability led Fricklas and Alonso to decide it was not ready for delivery.
"We're happy that it's working, but we're not confident on its reliability," said Alonso, adding that his primary concern was that an accidental collision might either break the desk or injure their client. Larry Bohs, the Duke assistant professor of biomedical engineering who teaches the course, says that work on the desk will continue in the spring semester.
Three of last fall's projects involved swings for children with limited mobility. Amy Congdon and Jessica Foley designed and built a freestanding motorized swing for a 4-year-old boy with cerebral palsy. Their biggest challenge was making sure the swing did not tip or rock, even on the highest of three speeds and with a 50-pound weight in its blue plastic seat. To stabilize the swing, Foley and Congdon filled the lower sections of its steel legs with sand, sealed off the ends, and mounted the entire apparatus on a rubber mat.
Their efforts paid off; at their final presentation, Foley and Congdon showed a short video clip of their calm and happy client, swinging back and forth in safety.
Austin Derfus and Greg Garbos also created a swing for their client, an 8-year-old girl with cerebral palsy, spastic quadriplegia, blindness, and 50 percent hearing. She loves to swing, sometimes for hours at a time, but needs an adult to push her. Garbos and Derfus solved that problem with their automatic swing, which hangs from a beam on the family's porch, has three speeds, and can support up to 150 pounds - a fact Derfus proved by testing it on himself.
The final swing came with a twist - literally. Jennifer Glasgow and Thomas Meese put together a jumper that allows a 5-year-old girl with cerebral palsy to spin and bounce around her living room, supported by a harness and bungee cords suspended from the ceiling. As the child grows, the harness straps and bungee cords can be adjusted to fit her changing needs.
Not all of the projects were created with specific individuals in mind. Ravi Baji and Brandon Stroy built a battery tester for Generations - Tadpole, an assistive technology lending library that employs physically and mentally disabled persons. The center needed a tester that would be easy for its employees to use, would work for multiple types of batteries, and would give distinct and obvious responses for good and bad batteries. Baji and Stroy's solution? A tester that flashes different-colored lights, vibrates, and speaks a recorded message - "good battery!" or "bad battery!" depending on the circumstances - when an employee slides the battery into a clear plastic box.
Bohs, who started the Devices for the Disabled class six years ago, said that most of the project ideas come from physical and occupational therapists in the Triangle area. Since there are always more ideas than students, pairs of seniors typically get to choose which project appeals to them the most.
Past projects have included a guitar strummer for a stroke-impaired budding musician, a "spinner" that enabled a 4-year-old boy with neurological impairments to sit erect and spin around without assistance, and child-friendly timing devices to assist children who cannot easily concentrate on important tasks, such as eating.
The National Science Foundation provides $500 grants for each project, and part of the students' challenge is staying within that budget.
Written by Margaret Harris.