The Design of Combing Hair Assistive Device to Increase the Upper Limb Activities for Female Hemiplegia

Abstract

Many researches show that the progress of the upper limb function of patients with more than one year apoplexy appears to be Learned Nonuse. This research takes concepts of the Constraint-induced Movement Therapy and User-Centered Design and develops the combing hair assistive device to increase the upper limb activities for female Hemiplegia. We adopt the AD-TOWS (Assistive Devices-Threats, Opportunities, Weaknesses, and Strengths) matrix to develop 33 design concepts among which 4 concepts are screened to make models, and then invite 5 participators in the experiment. By analyzing the results of upper limb lifting angle, the upper limb movement angle forced by the “Joint Adjustable Device” is the biggest, which is followed by the “Comb Convertible Device”, and then is the “Comb Convertible Lengthening Device”. The upper limb average angle of operating the above mentioned three assistive devices are bigger than that of operating the existing devices. By the result of the part unable to be combed, we find that the most difficult action to users who use the existing long-handled comb is to comb their sutural bone and occipital bone, however, the “Double-Handled Device” is good at improving the action unable to be done.