Qora Smart Glove - Reconnecting Partners After a Stroke

description

Qora Smart Glove is system to reconnect partners who experience a stroke. We began this project by looking at how people learn about objects by grasping them. While you gain knowledge by looking at the object, and feeling the weight in your hand, there is a wealth of other information that is missing in this interaction. 

Stroke survivors who experience short term memory loss often have many questions they need answered about the objects in their home, particularly in relation to their use and meaning. The Partner-Caregiver is most likely to handle these questions, and the responsibility of answering them on a daily basis can become a burden. We reasoned that if the Stroke Survivor has access to the answers they were looking for simply by holding the objects that prompted the questions, that we could help both partners regain some independence.

Our system is based on an interactive glove, sewn with conductive thread circuits. Each glove has an RFID reader that can read wireless tags attached to objects, pressure sensors to let the user communicate with the object by tapping their fingers, with LEDs and a vibrating motor for feedback. Using the glove, in combination with a bluetooth headset, the Partner-Caregiver records stories about objects they think would interest or help their partner, and attaches those stories to the object. Using the same glove, the Stroke Survivor is able to pick up the object, tap it using their thumb and index finger, and hear the story played back in the headset in the familiar voice of their partner.

Qora was a finalist in the ACM CHI Conference on Human Factors in Computing Systems 2011 Student Design Competition, submitted as a paper titled Interactive Therapy Gloves: Reconnecting Partners After a Stroke. Qora was then invited to be exhibited as a poster before being invited to be presented orally alongside the four other finalists.