Caltech Students Help Kids in Third World Countries
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Caltech students are using a school project to help kids in third world countries learn to walk again. These bed-ridden children don’t currently have the resources to help them walk. Caltech undergrad Stephen Wilke took a trip to Guatemala last summer and got a look at this dire situation firsthand. Wilke soon found the inspiration to create a solution. With help from Caltech undergrad Aric Fitz-Coy and Pablo Giron, a student from Landivar University in Guatemala, Wilke may have found the answer.
Wilke, a chemical engineering major, was visiting Guatemalan hospitals and other facilities as part of a class called Product Design for the Developing World, which has been taught at Caltech every fall for the past six years by Visiting Professor of Mechanical Engineering Ken Pickar. In December, at a poster session, Wilke and other students in the class presented their newest designs and devices, including a prototype of a new, inexpensive walker.
While in Guatemala, Wilke saw dozens of children confined to bed because of malnourishment, cerebral palsy, or other illnesses and infirmities. “Many of these kids have been in bed their whole lives,” said Aric Fitz-Coy, a junior in mechanical engineering who teamed up with Wilke. “We wanted to provide a step in a lengthy rehab process to get kids to start putting weight on their legs.”
So, this past fall, Wilke and Fitz-Coy, along with Pablo Giron, a student from Landivar University in Guatemala, researched commercial rehabilitation walkers and discovered that they ranged in price from $350 to more than $3,000. They estimated that to make such devices affordable in impoverished Third-World regions, they would need to bring the price down to under $100. Using PVC pipe normally used in plumbing, casters, Velcro, foam padding, and heavy-duty nuts and bolts, they created a sturdy and mobile frame-like structure that cost $88 in materials.
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Photo Courtesy of Caltech Today
