SBIR-STTR Award

We have designed a prototype lightweight, sturdy, user adjustable ergonomically designed backrest support for ultralight weight wheelchairs that will provide necessary postural support and provide a variety of positions to ease dressing, propulsion, and seated comfort. The backrest will improve user comfort, function, and posture during multiple activities of daily living. The innovative design will enable the user to adjust the backrest position while seated in their wheelchair. The benefits of the design are lightweight, high strength, adjustability and durability. The backrest will be adaptable to most ultralight manual wheelchairs. The backrest will be designed with a battery of features that benefit the user including height selection, backrest angle adjustment, backrest to axle positioning, and lumber support. The purpose of the proposed research is to create and test prototypes to identify issues that need to be addressed to develop a practical commercial device. The prototypes will be tested to insure that 1) its dimensions fit a wide variety of ultralight wheelchairs, 2) it meets of exceeds currently approved ANSI/RESNA wheelchair and seating standards, and 3) it performs equivalently of better than other comparable manual wheelchair backrests on ANSI/RESNA tests. A consumer and clinician focus group will evaluate the prototype models and their feedback will be incorporated into the design to be tested to the ANSI/RESNA standards. There are a wide variety rigid backrests commercially available; however, most are heavy, unappealing, and apt to fail under active use. Currently, there are no commercially available backrests that have the capability of being adjusted by the user while seated in the wheelchair. The innovative design of the Lightweight, Durable, and Adjustable Composite Backrest will provide necessary postural support and provide the user a variety of self adjustable positions to promote independence with dressing tasks and propulsion, while providing seated comfort during work tasks in a variety of environmental settings. The backrest will improve user comfort, function, and posture during multiple activities of daily living

Postural deformity is common among wheelchair users due to the tendency of the spine to flex under the influence of gravity. For individuals with paralysis of the trunk muscles, these postural deformities can occur quickly after injury and can reduce function and lead to painful fixed deformities. To delay the onset of these deformities, it is imperative that wheelchair seating be designed and prescribed which provides the necessary support to counteract gravity, but does not overly-restrict the users' ability to move their trunk so they can accomplish their daily activities. While sophisticated seating and position products for electric power wheelchair are on the market, advances for manual wheelchairs seating have focused on pressure relieving cushions. Rigid backrests are being marketed which replace the traditional sling designs are being marketed, and users' report an increased comfort over sling systems, but they have drawbacks which have limited their market penetration. The three primary drawbacks are (1) the increased weight of the rigid backrests over the sling systems, (2) discomfort when the user wants to perform non-mobility tasks, like dressing or relaxing (leaning back) , and (3) the inability to use the rigid shells on a folding-frame wheelchair. If these design shortcomings were mitigated, market penetration would increase substantially. We developed a Light-weight, Durable, Adjustable backrest (LWDAC) which addresses shortcomings (1) &(2) and was very well received by focus groups subjects. In this Phase II project, we will refine the LWDAC based on subjects' feedback, and introduce a quick-release mechanism to address shortcoming (3), which has already been developed for our other backrest system.

Public Health Relevance:
Despite the increased comfort and postural support that rigid wheelchair backrests provide, some users reject them because they restrict function during non-mobility tasks, like dressing or relaxing. To address these shortcomings, we have developed a Lightweight, Durable, Adjustable, Composite backrest system which allows the user to independently and easily adjust their backrest for all tasks.

Thesaurus Terms:
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