Mark

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Comment by Mark Lesek on November 22, 2010 at 5:33am

Thanks Wolf I really like the 2nd last post on your website titled new products

Comment by Wolf Schweitzer on November 22, 2010 at 5:13am

Yeah... that must be the way all of our Otto Bock hands look if you just take the rubber off.

Self-repairs are nice, but they are only effective if the resulting arm lasts considerably longer or performs a lot better.

My Otto Bock hand now has a slowly failing spring. So we investigated the issue. Repairing that will take the orthopedic technician about 6 hours and then you have a repaired mechanism that will fall apart at the same place later. Work alone will cost the insurance a lot. Replacing the whole hand will cost around 600$. While that seems like a lot, it fits the Regal Prosthesis cosmetic glove selection and as that it is cool to have, and cool to wear, and relatively affordable to pay.

With all man-power added up that it would take to go any other way, replacing the hand simply by ordering a new one is cheaper and more effective than repairing it, it is cheaper than replacing its mechanism, cheaper than getting other hands fitted with custom made gloves (a quote for a custom made glove by a local silicone specialist ranged around 8'000 to 12'000 $) and so on.

So, cost effectiveness is a real issue.

Current government spending is going in rather similar projects with projects such as Smart Hand, DEKA Arm and so on. From these one can see how much engineering is involved to develop new solutions. But it would be interesting to see - possibly in writing - where exactly your arm will improve existing solutions and in which way.

It already looks very cool :)