Four UTSA senior biomedical engineers developed an affordable and accessible wheelchair for young children. They will showcase their completed project this Thursday at the Tech Symposium. The event is scheduled to take place at the Convocation Center on May 1. The Tech Symposium is hosted each fall and spring semester — a crowd of judges and local organizations attend the UTSA event. Granting the opportunity for students, Tech Symposium offers real-life experience to pitch their project to those interested in taking their designs beyond the academic stage.
This spring semester promotes the innovation of senior design students and their projects that represent the culmination of skills and concepts learned throughout their engineering degree program.
This team of senior design students includes Diana Guzman, Sophia Cavanaugh, Ada Jaramillo and Dante Deluna Rodriguez. Guzman deals with Administration, Cavanaugh is the Project Manager, Deluna Rodriguez is the Design Engineer and Jaramillo is the Assistant Design Engineer.
This project has been developing over two semesters, and the four UTSA seniors have collaborated with mentors and nonprofits to achieve and execute their vision of an accessible pediatric wheelchair.
When one of their mentors, Dr. Hood, advised them on the idea to take on the project to assemble a wheelchair. The team took a step back and reflected on what other seniors will begin working on.
“We all got together, and we were like, ‘Okay, a lot of projects are going on right now, implantables and catheters but not a lot of pediatric work is going on.’ There is not a lot of stuff that would be non-profit,” said Cavanaugh.
“We have this option right here that warms our hearts. It was inspiring, and we all came together and thought, ‘If we do this, we could help somebody.’”
The team decided to partner with MakeGood, a 501(c)(3) non-profit devoted to assisting children with special needs, disabilities and chronic conditions. Their mission is to assist in navigating limitations that their current designs have. Current wheelchairs manufactured by MakeGood tend to be heavier, making them difficult to transport.
MakeGood sent a toddler mobility trainer to their Medical Design Innovations Lab, mentioning that it had some issues. The toddler mobility trainer was designed by Tikkun Olam Makers, an Israeli nonprofit organization and the original designers of these devices.
The trainer was made out of wood stuck together with wheels on either side. The problem was that it could not collapse to make it easily transportable, and it was expensive.
“Our design should be a lot easier to put together and give out, since it can easily fold and disassemble,” explained Cavanaugh.
Deluna Rodriguez, the design engineer of the group, designed the wheelchair with 3-D printed parts, bolts and nuts, PVC piping and pieces of wood from The Home Depot. These choices for parts lead to the low cost and ease of manufacture.
Additional key features of the wheelchair include an optional foot rest for shorter children, which can be easily taken out as they grow older, assisting kids between the ages of three to ten years old. Each component is lightweight and accessible to replace at any given moment, with just a quick run to the hardware store accomplishing the goal of making it attainable for anyone in need.
The team’s mission was to also have the chair be affordable as well, and to last for more than a couple of years in a child’s life.
“Some of the most basic models that you can find for pediatric wheelchairs start at $300 and very quickly rise to $3,000,” emphasized Deluna Rodriguez.
“The point isn’t necessarily to make a wheelchair that is much cheaper than what’s currently available. It’s to design something that can be given up for free because we’re aiming for the demographic of families that can’t necessarily afford to shell out those $300 at any one given time.”
The team has designed an assembly manual readily available to possibly pitch to a non-profit organization who can help design the wheelchair or distribute to families in need of the device.
“We also have an assembly manual that we made, so if you have the tool, you can go out to Home Depot, and buy them yourself,” said Cavanaugh.
Their overall long-term goal is to provide a comfortable, affordable and easily attainable wheelchair for children, assisting in the development stages of a child’s life by designing a chair that is not intimidating to them. They all agreed that aiding in the adolescent phase of life, both physically and socially, with a wheelchair like their design can help bridge the gap between kids of all ages
“It looks like a toy, which is the main goal, something that the kid can watch their dad put together, watch their mom put together,” Commented Cavanaugh.
“Other children in their class, not realizing that it’s something they need. It’s fun, but it’s serious, and it’s very helpful. We’re hoping that this design, along with other ones that are out there, would help children get the social interaction that they need and not progress their diseases.”
