Project 8 -- Technology for Play and Socialization for Children with Orthopedic Disabilities

Development of Innovative Adaptations

Commercially available aids for play and socialization are expensive and often fail to meet specific needs of children. Many innovative adaptations are created by parents, therapists and orthotists to meet specific needs. These adaptations are often useful to other children with similar needs, but there is no avenue for communication of these innovations. Each family must re-invent solutions for problems that other parents may have solved. Even when commercially available technology for play and socialization would be useful, funding agencies will often reject requests to pay for such items. Existing databases, such as Abledata, focus on commercially available items with wide potential application and emphasize items for adults, and self care.

Approach and Objectives

Our goal is to disseminate and develop AT devices for play and recreation for children with orthopedic disabilities. Our approach will be as follows:

• To provide a webpage through the Rancho Rehabilitation Engineering Program’s existing website and a publication disseminating innovative play and recreation devices custom-modified and/or custom-designed by users or their families.
• To foster student design projects at the University of Southern California and the California State University, Los Angeles for the development of play and socialization AT for children.
• To identify promising student design projects and collaborate with industry to manufacture prototypes for potential commercialization.

Current Status

On the recommendation of the panel for our formative review this project has been discontinued so we could foucus our resources on the other projects

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Last modified: Jan 05, 2004