
Tremor-cancelling spoon for Parkinson's tremors - mhb
https://www.liftlabsdesign.com/
======
97s
Things like this are just a total blessing to people who need them and its
awesome to see affordable technology like this taking place for people who
can't even take part in the one of the most important functions of life. A lot
of people are talking about if there is a big enough market/etc, we should
probably assume the creator only wants to cover his cost since this invention
was probably created by people who had family suffering from such a thing. Any
profits would probably make the inventor(s) delighted.

------
gottebp
I'm a little late commenting, but I developed a Windows app [1] that does
exactly this for the mouse. It basically applies some fancy FIR filters to the
x and y deltas. [1] www.steadymouse.com

~~~
gone35
Wonderful; like OS X's "Slow Keys" but for the mouse pointer instead. This
should be included as a built-in accessibility option in every operating
system.

Have you thought about open-sourcing your implementation to encourage others
to take a jab at it and port it to other platforms?

~~~
gottebp
Hey, thanks! I'd also love to see it built in to operating systems someday.
It'd be much cleaner and easier to implement there as well. When I wrote
steadymouse I had two choices: 1) Implement a driver (which is overkill if you
ask me) or 2) Use a mouse hook in a very convoluted way (As is, the low level
mouse hook doesn't easily let you "modify and pass on" mouse data). Applying
DSP math to the mouse would be much easier within the OS. As for open sourcing
the project, I've considered it and may eventually go that route. I'd like to
clean it up first though and have the time to stay a part of the active
development...maybe it's just hard for me to let go.

~~~
praneshp
Thanks for the product, and thanks for considering to make it opensource. If
you decide to go that route and have issues deciding what license to use, etc,
please let me know, I can put you in touch with an expert in licensing, etc
who can help you for free. And contribute code, ofc.

~~~
gottebp
Wow, I really appreciate that! /I must admit, the community here really
impresses me with comments like this.

------
caublestone
My brother has downsyndrome and struggles with muscle control. When he eats he
tremors quite a bit losing food on his plate forcing him to take a desperate
eat fast approach to his meals. He has gone through quite a bit of muscle
therapy to help. Needless to say, I will be buying this for him and can't wait
to see what other types of people find an improvement in their lives with this
product.

------
srean
I think some will remember the news story that Sergey Brin has the Parkinson's
mutation. He is keen to fund technologies that makes progress in this field.
That would indeed be welcome. Diagnosing Parkinson's with confidence with a
specific authoritative test is no easy task. For my dad, the doctors cannot
decide if it is essential tremor or Parkinson's.

I recall a post on HN which showed that our vocal signals have enough
information to help wwith such diagnosis. Voice as carried by phone's now dont
have the spectral resolution for this. However it might have enough bandwidth
if voice is coded for that purpose. Seems like a worthy problem to take a stab
at.

I think the corresponding NPR story
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7752627](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7752627)
was posted a few days ago but did not make the front page. So I am glad this
made it.

~~~
darkmighty
This video left a deep impression on me:

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uBh2LxTW0s0](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uBh2LxTW0s0)

I didn't realize how this sort of tech can be so life changing (or life
giving)

~~~
sirdogealot
That video is incredible to watch.

It is so amazing that I am slightly worried that it might be faked.

I really hope that this technology becomes an economically-viable and long-
term means of helping parkinson's tremors.

------
caycep
This is interesting, but IMHO, will not be as useful in most cases of
Parkinson's disease.

1) Parkinsonian tremor is typically at rest or with distraction. When you
actually engage in purposeful action, such as using a spoon, the tremor
usually dampens or goes away.

2) The main problem in Parkinson's is actually "bradykinesia" or slowness of
movement. A more accurate term, in my opinion, is slowness of motor planning,
that is, the brain systems cannot process the information require to, and then
generate, a plan of movement for the limbs fast enough. The spoon won't fix
that.

3) Parkinsonian and other forms of tremor do have relatively safe and
effective treatments in medications or deep brain stimulation implantation.

My thoughts are - this spoon, if it works and isn't a mechanical nightmare,
would be useful in a limited subset of cases where the tremor resembles
another condition known as essential tremor, where the tremor instead is an
intention or action tremor, where purposeful activity amplifies the tremor.
Even so, these would only be in those patients who cannot get deep brain
stimulation surgery for some reason. The reason being that DBS, while brain
surgery, once done, is the more elegant solution. I.e. your tremor goes away,
rather than requiring a superficial "hack" like this spoon.

~~~
chez17
This is such an HN reply. Tear everything to shreds. Who cares if it "would be
useful in a limited subset of cases where the tremor resembles another
condition known as essential tremor"? Seriously, no one is forcing you to buy
one. Be happy that people who are sick get the dignity of feeding themselves
back. This is only positive. This can only get better. FFS...

~~~
TeMPOraL
> _Tear everything to shreds._

That's also called "constructive feedback" or "having something useful to
say". OP offered his thoughts on the best cases where this technology could be
applied while explaining how Parkinson actually works and how this limits the
usefulness of this solution. If this is "such an HN reply", then this is also
the kind of reply for which I come back to this site.

~~~
gfosco
Lets just be clear... He recommended BRAIN SURGERY rather than a simple "hack"
spoon.

~~~
Rayne
Well, so would I. The spoon doesn't cure the symptoms.

~~~
Kluny
I don't know the exact numbers, but I definitely feel like brain surgery
carries a much higher risk with it than a new spoon. Some people might prefer
not to take that risk, especially in cases of elderly people who may not be
strong enough to survive surgery.

------
stevesearer
My grandfather has Parkinson's. My dad has slightly noticeable hand tremors -
no diagnosis at this point. I haven't read up on the likelihood that I'll get
it, but I assume that I'm at high risk.

That said, this looks pretty neat and seems like basically a spoon version of
Canon AF lenses. Will definitely look into these for my grandpa :)

~~~
doktrin
Likewise, my grandfather most likely had Parkinson's towards the end of his
life. My father has had essential / familial tremor for 3 decades or so.

I did at one point did check out my genetic risk factors as determined by 23
and Me, back when they provided trait mapping services. Turns out I have a
higher than average lifetime risk.

It's all ugly shit. Even essential tremor is non-trivial. I'm glad innovations
of all kinds are being made in this field.

~~~
lyagusha
No shit. ET is set off by everything - exercise, alcohol, caffeine, lack of
sleep, etc. In a perverse way it forces you to stop addictions to stimulants,
otherwise you can't help but look 50 years older in front of friends and
family because your fingers shake nonstop.

------
fletchowns
Heard about this on All Things Considered this week:
[http://www.npr.org/blogs/health/2014/05/13/310399325/a-spoon...](http://www.npr.org/blogs/health/2014/05/13/310399325/a-spoon-
that-shakes-to-counteract-hand-tremors)

------
jmadsen
This is wonderful!

I have to wonder - why is it that it took so long to come up with such a
simple idea for such an obvious problem?

I'd like to blame it on the "get rich, web app startup" mentality, but really,
that's a fairly recent thing.

Perhaps this is a harder problem than it seems? Or is it true that all our new
inventors are chasing riches?

~~~
atrus
Many things are obvious once you've seen them done.

~~~
jmadsen
I realize that, and know my comment sounds naive - but.

We have people who study earthquakes, and gyroscopes, and nerve disorders. And
we have the internet so they can all easily share ideas & research.

Is this idea REALLY so "un-obvious"?

~~~
cshimmin
Do we have people who study all three?

~~~
TeMPOraL
It _is_ , in my opinion, an obvious solution. Or at least it should be for
anyone who took control theory classes (or learned it by itself). So I guess
is that a/ people who know engineering don't know what medical problems are,
and (more likely) b/ there's a long, long way from an idea to working product.

~~~
logicallee
Don't mean to put too fine a point on it, but could you give me any example of
a consumer solution throughout history that you would not class as obvious?
I'm wondering what your standards are.

------
bigmattystyles
This sort of filtering should also be put in a mouse driver

~~~
cshimmin
Apparently user gottebp did just that:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7753993](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7753993)

------
Jim_Neath
As a sufferer of early onset parkinson's, it's great to see products like this
being developed. Hats off.

------
enjo
I would like to "sponsor" a few of these for folks. Does anyone know of a
resource, non-profit, or...something that can help facilitate that?

~~~
toomuchtodo
Their homepage says they match dollar for dollar for those in need. Get in
touch with them.

------
brianbreslin
My grandfather had parkinsons and this would have been a true blessing to him.
I watched in frustration many times as he had a hard time doing tasks like
this.

Seeing this kind of GOOD being invented makes me happy. This made my day.

------
jablan
I wonder why wouldn't be possible to use some kind of passive method for
tremor cancellation, like a miniature version of a steadicam.
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steadicam](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steadicam)

------
asgard1024
I like the idea, but I think the spoon is a bit shallow. It would be hard to
eat soup with it.

~~~
purephase
There's multiple attachments for the spoon. One of them might be a larger
spoon.

------
maddisc2
Well done, Really great work!

------
logicallee
Let's entertain the notion, prevalent here, that this idea itself (like all
ideas themselves) is worth absolutely nothing, and that any one of the teams
in the world who have access to gyroscopes, servos, and microchips, _should_
have the right to reproduce this hack at unit cost and drive these guys out of
business. Its cost is listed at $295.00[1] and this is their only product.
It's huge compared to what the best facilities and teams in the world can
produce to the same specifications, relatively unaesthetic as a utensil in its
present form as compared to what a better-funded team can produce in a matter
of weeks, and is clearly first-generation. They have no brand in the medical
space. It is an eating utensil, yet it is not waterproof.

It is, however, patented.[2] This single fact allows this company (in its
present form) to exist, to have done its research, to have raised its
investment, and to bring their prototype in the form we currently see to
market, at the price that it is currently listed at.

But patents are "wrong" and "stifle innovation".

Granted it's pretty obvious that this makes a huge difference in people's
lives. So perhaps we should leaven our desire that their margin disappear,
with hoping that more teams are somehow magically and irrationally in a
position to do the world's R&D before losing their shirts as their margins
disappear from under them. Having seen the size of this thing, the fact that
it's not waterproof, the lack of an existing trusted brand-name behind the
product, and a lack of any distribution except their web site (see their FAQ)
shows that there is no way that is the best that any team in the world can
build now that they've seen how it's done. Therefore, lacking protection, this
team would no longer be competitive in a short number of weeks/months.

We can, however, agree that it is good that this has been made. So, how shall
we reconcile this? Well, perhaps we should simply hope that funding, such as
they have raised, would magically continue to be available even without any
any margins that are guaranteed in the results (should they succeed in
embodying their claims), which would allow the investors to recoup their
investment. In short, we need investors to be crazy enough to keep funding
innovations such as this one, while we remove the protections that would
justify that craziness. Basically, we would have to hope that investors never
catch on.

This is crucial for our purposes, as otherwise ideas such as this would not
exist. Someone could have had this idea in 1999 or 1989. But without the
investment, it might have stayed at the "worth-nothing" idea stage, rather
than what we might call the "worth-nothing-but-has-now-actually-beend-
developed-and-actually-been-built-and-proven-and-it's-no-longer-a-pipe-dream"
worth-nothing stage. Which the rest of us deserve to access for free without
investing anything.

There is an analogy to be made here with Tesla, who died nearly penniless: his
meager earnings had come from his patent royalties. Imagine if we had the
ability to rewrite history and take even this away from him, along with the
food from his stomach and equipment from his labs, so that Edison and the rest
of the world's teams would have full access to all of his inventions, working
or impractical, without any protection. Imagine what progress that would have
led to.

In summary:

1- ideas like this deserve no patent protection

2- teams should prove incredibly speculative techniques such as this for free
and with no compensation or protection

3- investors should continue to invest in such ideas forever, even after it
becomes abundantly clear that there is no way to recoup the investment in such
a fledgling idea.;

</sarcasm>

Just kidding!! Phew. I hope we can all agree how ridiculous the above position
would be. It's great that these guys brought their patented, high-margin
product to the world. All this _could_ have been done in 1984 - 40 years ago -
if someone had had the 'wortheless' idea then -- and we would all have access
to it today.

It took a team's phenomenal genius and dedication today to bring this to
market, and the whole world will have it soon - unlike any of the Idea Sunday
ideas that have no such protection, were never fully developed, and for which
the entire program was crapped.

Here's to sane patents and to the progress they bring!

[1] [http://store.liftlabsdesign.com/](http://store.liftlabsdesign.com/) $
295.00. Note that my estimated margin at this price: (for copycat) 98.64%
margins - ex assumed "worthless" idea - assuming a COGS at scale of $4, which
is enough for several batteries, gyroscopes, microchips, cases, what have you.
If we assume a $20 cost of goods that margin shrinks to 93.22% gross profit,
again excluding the idea (which we assume is "worthless") or its development
(which we assume the world should have access to for free, now that they've
proven it.)

[2] [http://www.cnet.com/news/smart-spoon-helps-stabilize-
parkins...](http://www.cnet.com/news/smart-spoon-helps-stabilize-parkinsons-
tremors/)

~~~
rosser
I didn't downvote you despite my almost reflexive tendency to downvote posts
bitching about being downvoted.

That said, I was strongly inclined to ding you for the sarcasm. Any point you
might have been trying to make is obscured by the cloud of superiority and
smugness your tone radiates, and, personally, I find that both off-putting and
un-constructive. You could most assuredly use this invention as a means of
starting a discussion about crap patents — a position with which I probably
even agree in this instance — without burying your point beneath your
invective.

~~~
logicallee
The fact that one of the responses, ronaldx, completely agrees with the point
that I put in sarcasm, stating "The problem is that your sarcastic position
sounds pretty good to me", shows that while the position seems smug and
superior to you, it is actually a reasonable one around here.

The sarcastic part literally sounds pretty good to people here, and two
posters have expressed agreement with it.

And look at the result. We have two very good comments agreeing with the
sarcastic part (or denying its premise), and which we can now turn to.

~~~
rosser
Again, I'm not saying your position is wrong. I'm saying that your point is
buried beneath your sarcasm and your ceaseless series of edits and revisions.

~~~
logicallee
rosser: please bear in mind that while you are saying "I'm not saying your
position is wrong", two respondents actually agree with the position taken in
the marked "sarcastic part" :)

so this certainly identifies an avenue for discussion, even if you do not
prefer this way of bringing it up.

~~~
yownie
Please keep in mind what the poster is saying then, despite your position
being worthy of discussion your tone is stifling enough as to make further
discussion unpalatable.

~~~
logicallee
I believe it is the facts in this case that make the discussion unpalatable
for certain posters.

For example, separately, I actually wrote to this company during the comment
thread, and received a reply. I found their reply very informative and posted
it to the main thread (here:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7753308](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7753308))
with a simple statement which nobody could find objectionable. It is my
impression that someone nevertheless managed to find the facts themselves
objectionable.

~~~
icebraining
What "facts"? The fact that it wasn't any company research, but actually
university-funded? The fact that the inventor was doing a PhD, not working for
free?

~~~
logicallee
Yes, those facts among others. If anything these facts imply he "wouldn't have
needed" his patents, in order to get funded and build the thing.

------
rubyn00bie
Holy crap was I confused for a minute, I misread the title as "Tremor-
canceling spoon for Pakistan's tremors." I was just thinking "there must be A
LOT of earthquakes in Pakistan."

... Anyway this is a great invention, even if it's not intended to be used
during earthquakes ;-)

------
logicallee
I made a point about the importance of patents for this invention, but it is
better to receive it straight from the source:
[http://imgur.com/Q99L8V3](http://imgur.com/Q99L8V3)

(the bottom just quotes my letter, already visible)

This product and company would not exist without patents on what amounts to an
idea.

~~~
throwawaytremor
Huh? All your e-mail exchange proves is that he believed, at one point,
patents were a good idea.

In fact, it doesn't even prove that: If a stranger approached me about my
company's patents, you can bet I'd smile and nod say, "Yes, they're
important", like he did -- regardless of what I actually believe.

Establishing a written record of anything else sounds like a great way to
throw that investment -- valuable or not -- in the trash. Especially when the
remark is made to someone like you who then turns around and posts it to the
public!

As someone who both holds several patents _and_ has actually seen this device
in person, I think you're trying way too hard to craft your point.

(throwaway because my anti-procrast is on, oh well)

~~~
logicallee
Of course the email isn't meant to prove anything, I was just curious how long
his development time took. I only asked about the length of time of
development, nothing else, he volunteered the extra information, which is that
he would not have been able to raise any money without them (including what
sounds like a research grant) and that it was crucial to getting to market at
all (or whatever he said).

As it's all in the past, I don't see that this would help his patent case
today in any way. ("Please uphold the patent, because I really needed it back
when it was just an idea" doesn't seem a convincing reason to uphold a patent
today, as they are now on the market.)

So I read the information he volunteered as stemming from his experience and
perspective, rather than his interests.

I also see projects fail completely every day which could have succeeded with
a minimum level of patent protection on their narrow inventions. So there may
be a built-in survival bias, and you will not necessarily hear about these
projects, which fail to raise even a preseed research grant "round" to
complete development, but are abandoned isntead.

Page Rank was also patented by Larry Page. In stark contrast to the view
presented on Hacker News, ideas are extremely worthwhile and patents are one
of the most important tools any entrepreneur has for getting to market with
real innovation, which is unsure and costly, and requires people to buy in at
a pre-revenue stage.

The mechanism patents due this via is a full monopoly for a limited time. We
can see this in the price set on this invention (that we're discussing), which
is a monopoly price and will be upheld due to the fact that competitors are
not allowed in the same space.

In countries that do not acknowledge these patents, a $79 equivalent could
appear shortly. It can even be objectively better. Nevertheless, this is the
price we pay for this invention to exist at all, and but for the patent system
this invention would not exist at all. (In reality.)

