Man develops footrest adaptation for paralised girl

Abby needed something that allowed to keep her feet positioned and stable on the wheelchair footrest. She is paralysed from the chest down after having sustained a spinal cord injury. The girl has limited movement her arms and no fine motor control in her fingers.

“I have biceps but no triceps and very little core control. My problem is that when I am sitting in my wheelchair, I have spasms quite frequently that cause my feet to move out of position. When they are not in the right position, I am in quite a bit of pain. I am always calling my parents into my room to move my feet. And also because of this, I can never be left alone. That is quite a hardship on my parents”, she explained, when she reached out to May We Help.

So Ray, a volunteer from May We Help (an organisation that develops gadgets to increase the autonomy level of disabled people), created her a footrest that enables her to move her feet back into position by herself. He used plastic and hardware, and Abby got her device in 2015.

“I wanted to let you know that the modification you made had worked out beyond our expectations! When she has leg spasms now, the feet “magically” return to their proper position about 80% of the time. It has given her more independence as now she feels confident to be left alone for an hour or two at a time. And it has certainly helped out us as well, as we don’t have to worry about her being alone as much, and we don’t have to run and fix her feet all of the time now”, her family said.

Adapted from: https://bit.ly/31yHjZa