Assistive Tech

By Eric Rubel, EHLS There are many challenges in our homes that can make it difficult for people with limited mobility or disabilities to safely navigate. Fortunately, there are a number of available solutions that enable people to live safely at home. In this post, we’ll highlight the solutions that are most often added to make…

By Sheryl Bass, The Hadley School for the Blind In the eight years since the iPhone was invented, it has delighted social media savvy teenagers and overscheduled business professionals alike with its user-friendly design and its ability to respond to verbal commands with personal assistant, Siri. However, perhaps unexpectedly, the iPhone and other related devices (iPad,…

By Alexander Hoppe, Olin College of Engineering Currently 1 in 5 persons in the United States are living with a disability. In the coming decades, populations of people with ambulatory disabilities are likely to continue to increase. Toyota Motor North America’s Social Innovation division seeks to make mobility a source of inspiration and a way…

By Stanford Stickney In my senior year at UC Berkeley, I took a graduate class in Critical Making, where I met fellow students Tomás Vega and Oscar Segovia. Tomás shared with me his passion for creating technology for people with disabilities. Tomás and some of his friends including Pierre Karashchuk and Kelly Peng were working…

By Don Clayback, NCART On November 23, 2015, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid (CMS) published the 2016 Medicare fee schedule. As feared, the new payment rates include major reductions (as high as 30% to 40% or more) to critical components used with Complex Rehab wheelchairs. But there is still time to act! Complex Rehab wheelchairs and…

By Jennifer French, Neurotech Network “It just isn’t fair,” she thought, looking up at her children. Dawn Gast was on a trip in downtown Chicago with the three youngest of her seven children. While crossing busy Michigan Avenue, she tripped in the middle of the street and was bleeding with her children aged 5, 7…

By Curtis Merring, Permobil The application of power assist should move more from a reactive approach to a proactive approach. For example, instead of thinking, “I will get a power assist when I need it in the future,” we should think, “I’m getting a power assist device now, so I won’t need it in the future.”…

By Maricel Tabalba Coming up on September 22nd to the 28th is National Fall Prevention Awareness Week. This is a time to raise awareness about one of the biggest threats to the health of adults aged 65 and older. According to the CDC, an elderly person dies every 20 minutes due to a fall. This is especially…

By Jennifer French, Neurotech Network Being handed a card of a progressive neurological condition changes your perspective. Some neurological conditions can hit like a brick wall while others creep into your life. This story is the slow progression of Parkinson’s Disease, a degenerative brain disorder that impact 7-10 million people worldwide. The story of Dr.…

Any obstetrician, midwife or doula will encourage expectant parents to talk to their unborn child. He or she can hear for most of the latter half of the pregnancy and may actually learn to recognize the sound of Mom and Dad’s voice. But what if they can’t? For Lachlan Lever of Victoria, Australia, his gestation—along…

Tobii ATI, a leader in AAC and assistive technology devices and solutions, has kicked it up a notch. We’ve watched eagerly in recent years as they applied their eye-gaze technology to laptops and video games. But, now—virtual drum roll, please—we see the debut of the Tobii EyeMobile, uber-cool tech that gives you eye-only control of your Windows 8 tablet.…

By AXS Lab AXS Map (‘access map’) is a crowd‐sourced tool for sharing reviews on the wheelchair accessibility of businesses, restaurants, entertainment centers, and other day-to-day destinations available online or via mobile web, as well as Android and iPhone applications. For some it may be surprising to learn that as many as nine out of ten businesses on a…