An innovative manual wheelchair design concept that utilizes a lever for propulsion has been developed. It is well documented that levers promote a natural and efficient propulsion motion. Pushrim wheelchairs require an awkward motion that leads to injuries of the shoulders, elbows, and wrists for the majority of the 1.4 million users in the United States. These limitations also force users into power wheelchairs prematurely. The opportunity for rehabilitation is then lost. Lever propelled wheelchairs have not been widely successful due to their unintuitive operation and poor maneuverability, excessive weight, size, and complexity, or lack of important design features such as multiple gear ratios. The proposed design meets all the requirements formulated by users and wheelchair design experts. The design utilizes a single lever for propulsion located in front of the user's knees. Steering and braking is accomplished with a bicycle-style handlebar interface at the top of the lever. The lever propulsion mechanism was tested in Phase I and exceeded all the functionality and robustness requirements. A unique wheelchair design that fully exploits the advantages of the mechanism has been developed. A complete prototype will be built and fully tested in Phase II, including extensive user testing. The result will be a fully developed stand-alone product poised to create a new market segment between pushrim and power wheelchairs. A finance, production, and marketing plan appropriate for the unique characteristics of both the wheelchair market and this product has been developed.
Thesaurus Terms: assistive device /technology, biomedical equipment development, biomedical equipment safety, body movement, functional ability biomechanics, clinical trial, ergonomics, injury prevention, person with disability, quality of life, rehabilitation, repetitive motion injury clinical research, human subject, medical rehabilitation related tag
