Mouthsticks - A Participatory Approach.

Mouthsticks are quite an old kind of assistive technology (AT) but nevertheless they are up to now the Swiss army knives among AT. Unfortunately the popularity of mouthsticks massively decreased during the 1990s with the result that knowledge about how to produce good mouthsticks got lost and that there are hardly any adaptable mouthsticks available on the market. This paper discusses the development of a personalized mouthstick with the involvement of end users - people with severe physical disabilities - and occupational therapists as experts of everyday use. A participatory approach was chosen. The results of the analysis of a standardized questionnaire, group discussions and a collaborative workshop with IT-designers, polymer engineers, end users, occupational therapists and gender and diversity researchers are presented and discussed. This proved the necessity of the development of a personalized mouthstick.

Process Development for the Design and Manufacturing of Personalizable Mouth Sticks.

To increase the independence of people with reduced hand/arm functionality, a process to generate personalizable mouth sticks was developed based on the participatory design principle. In a web tool, anybody can choose the geometry and the materials of their mouth piece, stick and tip. Manufacturing techniques (e.g. 3D printing) and materials used in the process are discussed and evaluated.

The WebACS - An Accessible Graphical Editor.

This paper is about the solution to accessibility problems met when implementing a graphical editor, a major challenge being the comprehension of the relationships between graphical components, which needs to be guaranteed for blind and vision impaired users. In the concrete case the HTML5 canvas and Javascript were used. Accessibility was reached by implementing a list view of elements, which also enhances the usability of the editor.

4D-Joystick - New Possibilities for Persons with Motor Disabilities.

UNLABELLED: The 4D-Joystick is a new type of Assistive Technology which enables people with severe motor disabilities to fully control remote controlled (RC) toys i.e. MODELS: In 2013 the authors started to develop a feasibility study and built the first prototype of the 4D-Joystick which allowed to control up to 4 analogue and up to 2 digital channels. The second prototype of the 4D-Joystick allows to control up 4 analogue channels and 4 digital channels concurrently with very low latency. Furthermore the second prototype of 4D-Joystick supports functionality like Dual Rates, Expo, Invert and Dead Zone on each channel which offers additional adaptability to the users' needs. This is sufficient to control complex RC Models like airplanes, helicopters, multicopters, boats and cars. Furthermore the 4D-Joystick offers an interface to the open source software AsTeRICS. In combination with AsTeRICS the 4D-Joystick can be used as music instrument, a computer game controller and a computer input device. This paper discusses the second prototype of the 4D-Joystick and its functionality.

AsTeRICS: a new flexible solution for people with motor disabilities in upper limbs and its implication for rehabilitation procedures.

PURPOSE: To present the AsTeRICS construction set, and examine different combinations of sensors installed in the platform and how users interact with them. METHOD: Nearly 50 participants from Austria, Poland and Spain were included in the study. They had a heterogeneous range of diagnoses, but as a common feature all of them experienced motor limitations in their upper limbs. The study included a 1 h session with each participant where the user interacted with a personalized combination of sensors, based on a previous assessment on their motor capabilities performed by healthcare professionals. The sensors worked as substitutes for a standard QWERTY keyboard and a standard mouse. Semi-structured interviews were conducted to obtain participants' opinions. All collected data were analyzed based on the qualitative methodology. RESULTS: The findings illustrated that AsTeRICS is a flexible platform whose sensors can adapt to different degrees of users' motor capabilities, thus facilitating in most cases the interaction of the participants with a common computer. CONCLUSION: AsTeRICS platform can improve the interaction between people with mobility limitations and computers. It can provide access to new technologies and become a promising tool that can be integrated in physical rehabilitation programs for people with motor disabilities in their upper limbs. IMPLICATIONS FOR REHABILITATION: The AsTeRICS platform offers an interesting tool to interface and support the computerized rehabilitation program of the patients. Due to AsTeRICS platform high usability features, family and rehabilitation professionals can learn how to use the AsTeRICS platform quickly fostering the key role of their involvement on patients' rehabilitation. AsTeRICS is a flexible, extendable, adaptable and affordable technology adapted for using computer, environmental control, mobile phone, rehabilitation programs and mechatronic systems. AsTeRICS makes possible an easy reconfiguration and integration of new functionalities, such as biofeedback rehabilitation, without major changes in the system.