UNS: Walking and Talking: Improved Quality of Life Through Enhanced Mobility and Communication

这项工作将协同地将工程学、医生助理研究和商业的学生聚集在一起，努力开发辅助技术设备，以改善受损个人的行动能力和沟通能力。十个学生团队将直接与患者(最终用户)、教师和地区临床合作者合作，定义产品需求，评估初步设计，并评估最终设计的辅助设备。这种合作将促进设计解决方案，务实地解决日常生活中独立行动和交流的真正限制。商科学生的参与以及与Clarkson的希普利创新中心和Reh创业中心的有计划的互动所提供的营销专业知识将确保商业化潜力在整个设计工作中始终是重点。每个项目都将产生一个定制的原型，预计一些项目将产生适销对路的产品，使特定的用户群受益。此外，每个项目都将在工程学、医生助理和商业学生中形成以用户为中心的设计理念。学生将有独特的机会直接与临床医生和最终用户合作，了解与移动和/或通信限制相关的挑战，并将他们的集体专业知识集中在与临床相关的实用辅助设备上，以满足这些需求。这一重点将促进参与的学生获得独特的教育体验，突出工程原理如何应用于造福人类，从而提高对工程机会和社会参与的认识。学生们还将为每个设备制定工作台到床边的商业化计划，并在地区和国家出版物和会议上分享他们设计的产品。这项计划的总体目标是实施本科生设计体验，促进工程、商业和健康科学学生之间的跨学科互动。设计体验将在一个学年内进行，可以选择在整个夏天继续工作计划。每个设计体验将包括以下部分：1)问题识别，2)市场分析，3)设计概念化和分析，4)经济发展计划，5)设备设计和测试，6)桌面向市场过渡计划，7)最终原型设计，8)结果传播和推广活动。这项工作的智力价值在于将设计的辅助设备，以及本科生设计体验本身的框架，将工程、商业和健康科学专业的学生与临床提供者、最终用户和商业专业人员聚集在一起，开发定制的辅助设备和将设备推向市场的商业化计划。设计经验还将为本科生获得研究生教育和研究机会做好准备，这是克拉克森大学通过参与生物医学设计项目而建立的传统。这项工作的主要影响有三：1)为以用户为中心的辅助设备的设计、评估和营销建立了一个多学科协作框架；2)工程专业学生(和教师)与农村医疗保健提供者接触，其患者群体将从辅助设备中受益；以及3)建立必要的设计基础设施，以便克拉克森大学继续与临床专业人员和患者群体互动，以支持辅助设备的需求。最终，多学科学生团队、临床提供者和患者社区的互动参与将加强所有相关人员的广泛教育，同时解决对独立生活的限制，这些限制对整体生活质量产生不利影响。除了给学生带来好处外，参与设计过程的最终用户还将深入了解技术背景下的限制和需求，并了解工程师在提高生活质量方面所发挥的作用。

This work will synergistically bring together students of engineering, physician assistant studies, and business to work to develop assistive technology devices to improve the mobility and communication of impaired individuals. Ten student teams will work directly with patients (end users), faculty, and regional clinical collaborators to define a product need, evaluate preliminary designs, and assess the assistive device that is ultimately designed. This collaboration will facilitate design solutions that pragmatically address real limitations to independent mobility and communication in daily living. The marketing expertise provided by business student involvement and planned interactions with Clarkson's Shipley Center for Innovation and Reh Center for Entrepreneurship will ensure that commercialization potential remains a focus throughout the design effort. Each project will produce a custom prototype and it is expected that some projects will lead to marketable products to benefit specific user cohorts. Furthermore, each project will develop an ethos of user-centered design in the engineering, physician assistant, and business students.Students will have the unique opportunity to work directly with clinicians and end-users to understand challenges related to limitations in mobility and/or communication and to focus their collective expertise on clinically relevant and practical assistive devices that address these needs. This emphasis will facilitate a unique educational experience for participating students that highlights how engineering principles can be applied to benefit humanity, thereby increasing awareness of opportunities for engineering and societal engagement. Students will also develop bench-to-bedside commercialization plans for each device and share their designed products in regional and national publications and conferences.The overarching goal of this proposal is to implement an undergraduate design experience that fosters interdisciplinary interactions between engineering, business, and health sciences students. The design experience will be carried out over an academic school year with the option to continue the work plan over the summer. Each design experience will include the following components: 1) problem identification, 2) market analysis, 3) design conceptualization and analysis, 4) economic development plan, 5) device design and testing, 6) bench top to market transition plan, 7) final prototype design, and 8) dissemination of results and outreach activities.The intellectual merit of this work lies both in the assistive devices that will be designed, as well as the framework of the undergraduate design experience itself, which brings engineering, business, and health sciences students together with clinical providers, end users, and business professionals to develop customized assistive devices and commercialization plans for bringing the devices to market. The design experience will also prepare undergraduates to pursue graduate education and research opportunities, a tradition that has been established through prior students involved in biomedical design projects at Clarkson.The main broader impacts of this work are threefold: 1) the establishment of a multi-disciplinary collaborative framework for the design, evaluation, and marketing of user-centric assistive devices, 2) the engagement of engineering students (and faculty) with rural healthcare providers whose patient populations will benefit from the assistive devices, and 3) the establishment of the necessary design infrastructure for continued Clarkson University interaction with the clinical professionals and patient populations in support of assistive-device needs. Ultimately, interactive engagement of multi-disciplinary student teams, clinical providers, and patient communities will enhance the broad education of all involved while concomitantly addressing limitations to independent living that adversely impact overall quality of life. In addition to the benefits to students, the end users involved in the design process will gain insight into articulating limitations and needs in a technical context and an appreciation for the role that engineers play in quality of life enhancements.