PhysioFriend

Improving surgical outcomes by encouraging good physiotherapy

the brief

Lamb Industries was honoured to be invited to work with material scientists, other designers and engineers on the EU FP7 project: Light Touch Matters (LTM). A unique cooperation with 17 partners from 9 EU countries, with the aim of finding applications for a new material in the healthcare industry. This resulted in ‘PhysioFriend’, a wearable aid for physiotherapy.

the design

Surgeons say that a good surgical outcome is 50% surgical success: 50% good patient rehabilitation

PhysioFriend is an intuitive wearable device that guides people through their physiotherapy rehabilitation after orthopaedic surgery. PhysioFriend removes the confusion and anxiety of completing exercises incorrectly at home. It accurately records the Range Of Motion and Repetitions to reassure the patient, and their health professional, that they are on target with their recovery.

LTM worked with the latest developments in polymeric piezo materials and flexible OLEDs to combine touch sensitivity with luminosity. Through product-user interaction research, we were also able to explore the meanings elicited by the new materials under development, to encourage users to want to do their rehabilitation exercises and make the process more enjoyable.

This prototype is aimed at knee recovery but there is no reason why the technology could not be applied to other joints. PhysioFriend could even be used by athletes as a training aid to view and record development.

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