Most people view the iPad as a slick multi-media entertainment platform, but Gregg Vanderheiden, a university professor, sees other potential uses for Apple’s new touchscreen device.
“Say you have somebody who’s had a stroke, for example, and they wake up and they can’t communicate,” said Vanderheiden, director of the Trace Research and Development Center at the University of Wisconsin at Madison.
“Instead of buying a US$5,000 communications aid, you take out your iPad and download an app and — bam! — they can communicate,” he said.
The Trace Center helps people who are unable to speak and have disabilities to communicate and Vanderheiden is one of a number of researchers and others excited about the iPad as a relatively low-cost communications tool.
“There’s a lot of interest in the iPad,” said Karen Sheehan, the executive director of the Alliance for Technology Access, a California-based group that seeks to expand the use of technology by children and adults with disabilities.
Stroke victims, people with spinal cord injuries, cerebral palsy or ALS, a paralyzing nerve disease, and children or adults with autism are seen as just some of those who could potentially benefit from the iPad.
“Anyone who’s non-verbal and needs a device to speak for them,” Sheehan said. “People with Alzheimer’s who do better with graphic-based communication boards instead of trying to search for a word.”
“People with traumatic brain injury, soldiers coming back from Iraq or people who’ve been in automobile accidents,” she said.
Sheehan said “there are a lot of powerful communications devices out there, some very good companies, but they tend to run into the thousands of dollars, which can be prohibitive for a lot of people.”
“You can take the iPad and turn it into a communications device very inexpensively,” she said.
The cheapest iPad costs US$499 and the most expensive US$829.
A company called AssistiveWare has already adapted for the iPad a communications application called “Proloquo2Go” it designed for the iPhone and the iPod Touch and is offering it for US$189.99 in Apple’s App Store.
“Prologuo2Go” allows people who have difficulty speaking to communicate using symbols to represent phrases or by typing in what they want to say and having it converted by text-to-speech technology into a natural sounding voice.
Sheehan said the iPad’s large touchscreen makes it potentially more useful to a wider range of people than the iPhone or the iPod Touch.
“They’re such a small area and for someone who has limited fine motor it’s hard to hit small icons,” she said. “It’s easier on the iPad to just click on an icon to say ‘I want juice,’ or ‘I want to watch a movie.’”
Joanne Castellano, the director of New Jersey-based TechConnection, which provides “assistive technology” solutions to people with disabilities, said the “avid Mac users” in her office are “chomping at the bit” for an iPad.
“They keep asking me ‘When are we getting one?’” she said.
“I’m sure we’ll get one,” Castellano said. “It seems like it would be something very useful to the community that we serve.”
“For anybody who has a reading challenge it’s useful because it has a nice feature where it reads books out to you,” she said.
Castellano agreed that the touchscreen controls are part of the attraction of the device, but said some of the gestures could prove challenging to some.
“The way you have to pinch some things with your thumb and your forefinger — that movement might be a problem for some people,” she said. “But to turn the page of a book you just have to swipe it so that could be very helpful.”
Dan Herlihy of Connective Technology Solutions said he would be adding the iPad shortly to his “treasure chest” of hardware and software tools he uses to address the needs of people with disabilities.
“And I can already think of about half a dozen things I’ll run on it,” he said, touting its potential use, for example, as an educational device for children with dexterity issues.
“For some kids it’s a lot easier to just put your finger on something and drag it than it is to have to click and drag and drop with a mouse,” he said.
Vanderheiden said the iPad is a “great platform — small, inexpensive, a lot of power, a long battery,” but its greatest contribution to the needs of the disabled may be from the applications built for the device.
“They offer the opportunity for just tremendous, unprecedented innovation,” he said. “The really key part is that it’s a development platform that allows people to be creative. That’s where the power comes from,” he said.
‘NO SECURITY RISK’: The Railway Bureau reassured the public that the technicians’ activities were limited to technical guidance and did not involve sensitive systems The Railway Bureau yesterday said it had invited eight Chinese technicians to assist with an airport MRT construction project. The bureau issued the confirmation after an Internet user said Chinese nationals had entered the construction zone of Taiwan Taoyuan International Airport’s Terminal 3 project. They asked why “individuals from an enemy state” were allowed access to such a major national infrastructure project, which raised serious concerns over Taiwan’s industrial safety, sensitive systems and information security. The bureau’s Northern Region Engineering Branch Office said subcontractor Taiwan Handle Industrial Co (台灣手把工業) of the Taoyuan airport MRT’s “Contract No. CU05 Project A14 Station Civil, MEP &
The National Chungshan Institute of Science and Technology yesterday showcased its locally developed variants of the Vision 60 robotic patrol dog, which it plans to deploy on the nation’s outlying territories in the South China Sea. The variants were produced under the Joint Lab project — created by the institute and domestic companies — and assembled with domestically produced motors, lenses and artificial intelligence (AI) systems alongside licensed tech from the US, Missile and Rocket Systems Research Division deputy director Jen Kuo-kang (任國光) told the media event at a military base in Taipei’s Dazhi (大直) area. Taiwan has built up its strengths
TIT-FOR-TAT: The US allegedly revoked the visa of a Chinese national working at Xinhua News Agency in the US in response to Beijing’s expulsion of Vivian Wang The Presidential Office yesterday condemned China for expelling a New York Times correspondent from Beijing following the newspaper’s interview with President William Lai (賴清德), saying the move highlighted Beijing’s suppression of press freedom and its threat to international news media. Taiwan has noted a series of recent incidents in which Beijing used similar tactics to “threaten and pressure international media outlets and journalists,” Presidential Office spokeswoman Karen Kuo (郭雅慧) said in a statement. “This concerns not only press freedom and freedom of expression, but also the safety of journalists, and Taiwan and relevant partners are paying close attention to the situation,” she
NOT IMMEDIATE: Taiwan has a chance to appeal the proposed 10 percent tariff before it starts, while other countries face a 12.5 percent tariff from the trade office Taiwan is among 60 economies determined by the US to have failed to impose or enforce a ban on the importation of goods produced with forced labor, according to a notice released on Tuesday by the Office of the US Trade Representative (USTR), which proposed imposing an additional 10 percent or more tariff on them. The USTR in a statement said that following an investigation, it had determined under Section 301 of the Trade Act of 1974 that the failure of the 60 economies to impose and effectively enforce a prohibition on the importation of goods produced with forced labor is
RSS