

Father's homemade machine helps disabled son to walk (video) - unfasten
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-latin-america-15695991

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freejack
My son has cerebral palsy and I can see the immediate benefit that a machine
like this would bring to him. We are currently using a similar harness on a
regular treadmill, but this therapy doesn't help him learn that he needs to
raise his feet and move them in a circular motion forward and then set them
down again - seeing how the machine handles this using the same idea as an
elliptical trainer immediately opened my eyes to the deficiencies in the
approach we're using in the modern clinic we're attending. I would love to be
able to help fund the development and manufacture of these devices in some
way.

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esalazar
You can always use kickstarter.com to fund projects like this one.

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steve_b
At the moment only US residents can create projects on Kickstarter. It's going
to be awesome when they expand to other countries.

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marquis
Someone could do it on his behalf, no?

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esalazar
There is also indiegogo.com which I believe is available to anybody in the
world.

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codingsolo
It goes to show that a man's love knows no boundaries of current science and
technology. Innovation driven by determination can change fates. One of the
best dads ever.

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cyanbane
Agreed, THIS is hacking.

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davidedicillo
I wish more hackers would invest their time and energies in this kind of
projects. Inspiring.

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melling
I wish the HN readers would take on projects as a group. There are enough
technical people that as a group would could actually accomplish a lot. I
guess the trick is to find the right problems to crowdsource.

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ph0rque
_I guess the trick is to find the right problems to crowdsource._

Crowdsource that part, as well.

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miles_matthias
This is the kind of entrepreneur I hope to be someday. A man on a mission,
fixing something close to his heart. Just awesome.

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StavrosK
I have literally never seen a single video on that BBC site, on any of my
machines. It just keeps loading. Is it just me?

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unfasten
I think there are 2 reasons videos from the BBC don't load.

The first, which I'm almost certain stops the loading, is having your Flash
privacy settings to never store any information. I have mine set to ask me
when a new site wants to store information, but I can't set it to "No. Don't
ask me again" on the BBC because if I do then the videos never load. I have to
hit the "Deny" button when it prompts me, which it does, annoyingly, multiple
times throughout a single video.

The second possible reason could be blocking of ad servers, but I'm not sure
about this one.

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StavrosK
Ugh, what a stupid implementation. I'll give it a shot, thanks.

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nowarninglabel
There is so much inspiration here.

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brianobush
A father's love, creativity and the hunger to fix what is broken. Awesome!

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mattwilsoninc
Incredibly inspiring.

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maeon3
Am I the only one who finds it disturbing that a mechanic was able to
accomplish something that first world medical industry said couldn't be done?

It just goes to show that if you have a disease, condition or injury, life
threatening or not. It pays to self diagnose and be your own doctor. We can
specialize more in our specific problem than an entire industry devoted to the
body of all problems.

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meta
I think my key take-away would have been: the closer you are to the problem
the better your solution can be.

I would venture to guess current therapies were developed by health
professions and engineers at arms length to intended patients (via books and
maybe some user-testing in constrained environments).

This solution was inspired and developed by a father who is involved with the
health problem every day for long periods of time in real world situations.
That provided a much better view of the problem space.

I am not sure if self diagnosing is a great idea or what I would identify as a
key take-away. But accepting solutions blindly could be.

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hansy
Indeed...it's really difficult (in time measures) for doctors or physicians to
reach a level of familiarity with the patient on par with the relationship the
patient has with his/her family, friends, etc. This inability to do so often
leads to oversights.

True story.

My ex-gf started experiencing cardiac arrests in college, which is rare for
individuals of her age. Of course, her parents took her to some of the top
physicians in the U.S. as well as in London and they all claimed she needed a
very risky surgery for her heart. The arrests were scarring her heart tissue
and any new arrest could permanently damage the organ further.

The doctors knew that she would experience these arrests when she became
extremely emotional or stressed out, yet couldn't pinpoint exactly what the
problem was. They simply thought she had an unnaturally fast heartbeat, which
led to the arrests. As her bf, I had taken her on amazing dates and watched
horror movies with her, so I knew that I had put her through various emotional
stages (complete with crazy fast hearbeats) without her ever experiencing an
arrest.

Luckily at the time, I was studying Endocrinology in college, so I proposed
that there might be particular hormones in her system that weren't being
flushed out of her body...which is very dangerous because the hormones can
continually innervate vital organs; in my gf's case, her heart.

Sure enough they found that her body wasn't producing the correct enzymes to
degrade the hormones and so she began a regimen of artificial hormones. I am
proud to say that in the 4 years since she has been on the treatment, she has
been perfectly normal! And all without any damn surgery.

I'm not a medical professional, but I knew my gf in and out. I think that the
medical world would greatly benefit if there was some sort of greater
collaboration between patient and doctor. Doctors are so busy that they don't
have time to really understand the patient outside of the ailment at hand. At
the same time, I understand how busy doctors are and how detached they must
remain in order to maintain objectivity and professionalism.

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jianshen
I'm going thru something similar right now with a loved one and my experience
is the same. Patient-Doctor (or in our case Patient Party-Doctor) rapport is
the most important thing to a better outcome. Doctors are far more willing to
listen and work with you when you can establish 1) you have objective goals in
mind and 2) you've done your homework.

Thanks for telling your story.

