Young innovator turns to 3D to scale up stroke recovery tool
8 Sep 2024
Innovate UK’s 2023 Young Innovators award winner is using 3D printing to put his stroke recovery therapy tool into the hands of patients.
Orlando Ely’s Blossom tool is intended to rebuild the fine motor skills often lost after stroke and other cognitive impairment.
The handheld device allows users to build three flower designs of increasing complexity to engage and exercise hand, eye and brain coordination by accessing a total of 16 pinch and grasp exercises. Its combination of patterns, nature reference and creative are intended to help boost mood and motivation to enhance recovery prospects.
"Blossom’s nature-inspired design sets it apart from other therapy tools on the market, which can sometimes appear juvenile. The tool combines the beauty of flowers and their phyllotactic patterns – the regular arrangement of leaves and petals on a plant stem – providing both cognitive and sensory stimulation,” he explained.
“This activates brain regions associated with reward, encouraging repeated use, essential to the tool’s effectiveness. The design offers a fresh, versatile approach to this kind of repetitive, but essential, therapy.”
Ely’s invention, inspired by two of his close family who suffered strokes, won him £15,000 in funding support from Innovate UK, to help him develop a prototype for wider use.
He secured the collaboration of the National Manufacturing Institute Scotland (NMIS), part of the High Value Manufacturing Catapult and operated by the University of Strathclyde. The NMIS Design Engineering and Additive Manufacturing teams helped enable Ely to convert the initial design into a viable product for use with the aid of 3D modelling to refine the tool.
Using a powder bed fusion (PBF) process, the researchers were able to build a product with a suitably textured finish, made of sufficiently strong and durable material.
The product was also consumer tested, with clinical consultation and help from users recruited through dementia groups.
Added Ely: "With assistance from NMIS to evaluate different manufacturing methods, I'm now well positioned to approach a partner that can manufacture the product at scale. Based on user feedback, my next phase will focus on refining the design, enhancing aesthetic appearance, and expanding the range of therapeutic applications.”
