Students at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), lead by Assistant Professor Amos Winter, have designed and created a new wheelchair inspired by and made with parts of mountain bikes. The wheelchair, initially designed for use in developing countries around the world, is now available in the United States, and people in the disability community Read more…
Every year, we see technology take another big leap forward. From virtual reality to driverless cars, smart watches and more, we’ve seen a lot of neat, new gadgets surface. In 2016, we also saw a lot of new prosthetic and wheelchair technology brought to consumers. We even saw a few new wheelchair vans brought Read more…
A small group of Google employees just completed a project that should make any person in wheelchair smile: Google Maps is now wheelchair friendly! The application will now tell users whether locations they are viewing are accessible to people with disabilities. Not only will you be able to travel to a place in your wheelchair Read more…
Today marks the 75th year since the attacks on Pearl Harbor plunged the United States into World War II. On December 7th, 1941, a day that President Roosevelt called “a date which will live in infamy,” 2403 people died in attacks that began at 8:00am and would last for about two hours. Today we Read more…
Houses are becoming more intelligent. Just like watches, phones and many other everyday devices, modern homes will one day be able to automate processes that are inconvenient or impossible for people with disabilities. Just like how wheelchair vans have offered freedom and independence to wheelchair users, smart devices will one day offer the same independence when Read more…
One of the world’s first head transplant patients will receive a lot of help from a specially-coded virtual reality program before he undergoes his first surgery, which doesn’t have a set date at this time. Valery Spiridonov, a Russian man in his 30s suffers from a very rare condition called Werdnig-Hoffman, a type of spinal Read more…
A University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee (UWM) professor has created a geared wheelchair system that introduces a new “low gear,” similar to what you would see on a bicycle. Associate professor Brooke Slavens created the system in order to make getting around in a wheelchair easier and less painful for long-term users. How the System Works Read more…
Today’s latest scientific discovery comes from a group of Swiss scientists at the École Polytechnique Fédérale in Lausanne, Switzerland, who successfully created a connection between a group of monkeys’ brains and their hind limbs, which they have been unable to move due to paralysis. This connection was made using something rather familiar to most people Read more…
About one in 190 Americans currently lives with the loss of a limb, and this number has the potential to double by the year 2050. While there is a multitude of adaptive technology and devices available to everyday consumers – wheelchairs and accessible vans – prosthetic and robotic limbs have been on the rise Read more…
There are few people in this world who actually enjoy the experience of air travel. Flying is stressful, often rushed and filled with unexpected interruptions. For wheelchair users with very limited mobility, and their families, flying in a plane is wrought with inaccessibility. The obstacles are often small, but sometimes they can turn into nightmares. Read more…
