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Sarah de Lagarde faced immediate changes when she returned to work after losing her two limb use in an accident, but the employer’s willingness to reintegrate her into office life was just as important as the technology she currently lives in.
De Lagarde, head of global corporate affairs at Asset Manager Janus Henderson Investors, became one of an estimated 60 million people living with amputations due to traumatic causes when he fell into a truck in 2022 at the final stop on the North Line of the London Underground. Two trains ran over her, amputating her right arm and crushing her legs.
Before the accident, Delagarde had the view of the glory of prosthetics and amputees.
Her experience is that living with bionic limbs is one of the struggles, costs and clinical trials. Rather than becoming a “superhuman,” she says, “the reality is that this image can be very misleading and we don’t perfect our technology or medical prosthetics.”
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Today’s bionic limb market is small, and research is hampered by lack of user collaboration, data and impaired representation. Prosthetics today are cumbersome and urge many to abandon their use, the University of Utah said in a 2022 report.
De Lagarde is keen to test new prosthetic adaptations and give feedback. When her first bionic arm got too hot and shortened the battery life, she suggested some solutions.
She has since adapted to attaching hand gel-covered socks designed by Ottobok in the pinlock system. This means that you can slide more smoothly and improve muscle movement detection.
However, every six months, alternatives, physical therapy and weekly supplies are at mental and financial sacrifices.
A UN survey found that people with disabilities represent the world’s largest and fastest growing minority. Globally, more than 2.5 billion people need one or more supportive products, the World Health Organization said in a report last year that it estimates it will increase by 100 million by 2050.
In the United States, 5.6 million people experience losses or differences in limbs, according to the nonprofit Amputees Association.
AI-driven assistive technology is the force behind prosthetic leg and transcription apps, and promises to change the conditions for disabled staff around the world.
However, potential users and businesses face sudden prices. This, Coapt Engineering, which creates pattern-based control techniques within the upper limb prosthesis, estimates that the cost of a bionic hand will be up to $45,000.
Jacob George, director of the University of Utah’s Neurotoxicity Institute, helps develop electric limbs covered in silicon “skin” that allow amputees to move at their own thoughts.
The prosthesis, named “Luke” arm, after the robot’s hand that Luke Skywalker received in the Imperial Strikeback film, also restores the sense of touch.
The arms sold for $200,000 by US-based Mobius Bionics and the hands of the Italian Institute of Technology “Hannes” are announced by researchers as the best AI-assisted upper limbs in the market and development.
However, the possibilities for these devices are limited by the numbers generated. There are only eight Luke Arms in use, and 30 Hands Hands are generated.
One of the few options on the elbow, the arm picks up nerve signals rather than muscle signals.
AI helps to amplify this process in the residual limbs and can decode motion patterns. AI “may not be perfect,” says George, but “it’s still a driver’s person.”
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As more products come to the market, costs can drop. Texas startup Alt-Bionics predicts that the cost of a Genesis prosthetics in the clinical trial stage will be $5,000, but established body-driven solutions such as Becker Hands are typically under $1,000.
Be careful about technology. Britt H Young, a lecturer at the University of California, Berkeley, was born with little of his left forearm, but after years of attempting different prosthetics, he was disillusioned with the high-tech version of AI Bionic Limbs.
Each new device requires potentially robbing of simpler, cheaper and effective prosthetics, but ultimately “disabled people will be responsible for getting them,” Young says.
She stopped using prosthetic weapons in graduate school and is wary of AI. “Disabled people don’t see in the world of technology,” she says, excluded from the design process “because it’s not beneficial to include them.”
In fact, opportunities for bias in using and designing assistive technologies are at the heart of the Institute for the latest findings of consumers with disabilities. Gordon McCullough, the institute’s chief executive, says the message is “not to end, it involves people with disabilities at first.”
De Lagarde, who advocates assisted care as “basic human rights” and for the ethical use of AI, looks at a future where the two can work in tandem.
“Wanting a functional arm is not a luxury,” she says. “These costs need to be democratized. I think technology can reduce costs, even if that’s a challenge.”
