Consulting Prosthetics Student Proposal

Note: At this link, you will find this proposal in context of a corresponding thread for discussion.

Proposal:
To hire Chang Liu, the re-NABLE intern of summer 2018, as a consulting prosthetics student from Oct 2018 - May 2019 at $15/hr, 10 hours/week.

Summary:
Chang Liu, current 4th year student (2018-19) of the Prosthetics and Orthotics department, has done a summer internship with e-NABLE, a global community that provides under-resourced users with 3D printed prosthetic arm solutions. Through this internship, it has become clear that the collaborative input of prosthetics students and e-NABLE engineers/designers will lead to better innovation, and the provision of safer and more functional 3D printed prostheses for recipients globally. She has presented on the outcomes of this internship and this funding proposal during the SPC meeting on 12/10/18. Chang would like to seek funding to be employed for 10 hours a week to help extend this collaboration to additional P&O students of Strathclyde in the following ways:

1. Chang will be available for prosthetics student consultations by anyone within the e-NABLE community, giving advice as a provider of prosthetic knowledge (not as a trained clinician).

2. Chang will test and document, for e-NABLE volunteers and for the professional prosthetic community, several new methods of creating self-suspended trans-radial sockets for under-resourced communities.

3. Chang will write a prosthetics student learning manual for the e-NABLE community: Using the information learnt from the past 3 years of prosthetic training by the University and at clinical placement, she will write a document for non-prosthetists providing basic background knowledge of upper limb anatomy and prosthetics, and guidance on when and how to seek advice from certified medical professionals.

4. Chang will present to and recruit Strathclyde Prosthetics students to encourage future e-NABLE and Strathclyde collaborations.

The maximum total amount requested = ($15/hr x 10hrs/week) x 32 weeks = $4800. During this period, all work done will be on a shared Google document, and all hours will be logged on an open access timesheet. As Chang graduates from the Prosthetics programme at the end of May 2019, she will be able to enter the Prosthetics field as a fully trained clinician. As she will then have a source of income, this funding from e-NABLE will cease then. After May 2019, she will continue working with e-NABLE from Singapore, where she will be working in the future.

General Job Descriptions:
- Write-up of methodology for self-suspended trans-radial sockets made from thermoformed soda bottle and pre-made semi-modular flexible elbow caps.

• Write-up of methodology for self-suspended trans-radial sockets made from 3D printed materials and modified from 3D scans and digital elbow caps.
• Publish and present paper on innovative methods of creating self-suspended trans-radial sockets for under-resourced communities. This involves recruiting novices and patients to test the replicability of the methodologies described, and submitting the socket designs themselves to (informal) clinical and mechanical tests. An abstract to present at TIPS 2019 (Prosthetics conference) has been submitted, which will hopefully bring e-NABLE to the prosthetists’ table.

1. To collaborate with re-NABLE, Martin Bionics, Nate Munro, Alexandra Lamp, and Dominick Scalise on above-elbow solutions: New mechanical elbow and hand solution, and socket + harnessing solutions.

2. To be available for prosthetics student consultations by anyone within the e-NABLE community.

3. To write a prosthetics student manual for the e-NABLE community: At each level of limb loss, the anatomy specific to it, the rationale behind socket and prosthesis designs, and the green+yellow+red flags for customising+delivering prostheses to non-conventional users.

4. Long-term goal: To set up the groundwork for future e-NABLE and Strathclyde collaborations. As Chang is currently on clinical placement, prosthetics students recruitment will commence Jan 2019.
   -To expand the network of consulting prosthetics students for e-NABLE by recruiting prosthetics students from Strathclyde.
   -To encourage collaborative innovation and alternative solutions for under-resourced communities using prosthetics knowledge, readily-available materials, and emerging 3D scanning + printing technologies.

Current Achievements from re-NABLE Internship (July-Aug 2018):
1. Flexible Elbow Caps (FECs): Pre-made from +ve plaster model of the desired suspension indentations + bony allowances at the elbow. - Mass producing and distributing these semi-modular FECs of different sizes to e-NABLE volunteers will allow prosthetic novices to create clinical-standard sockets for users. Successful testing of prototype on user. Still conducting experiments on other materials to create FECs, besides the hot glue currently used.

1. Thermoforming of Soda Bottles to create Self-suspending Trans-radial Socket: Achieved a replicable method of shrinking soda-bottles around +ve plaster models, producing conforming sockets with the required structural rigidity. Successful testing of prototype on user.

2. 3D-Scanning + Digital Modifications + 3D-Printing of Self-suspending Trans-radial Sockets. Successful testing of prototype on user. Possibly incorporating full-length cosmetic non-functional prostheses, especially for communities such as users from Heidi).

3. Conceptualisation of pre-flexed sockets for both above and below elbow limb loss users with short residual arms: to increase flexion angle of prosthesis, hence greatly increasing functionality of prostheses provided. Successful use of the double Ugunugu elbows as initial prototype for this concept.