Meet Emma Lawton, a 33-year-old graphic designer from London, who was diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease at the age of 29. As a graphic designer, drawing makes up about 80% of the work needed to be done, but because of the tremors in Emma’s hands, she has been unable to draw straight lines or write her name, let alone pursue her career and passion for drawing.
Parkinson’s disease is a chronic neurological condition which affects around 500 people in the UK, and is yet to have a cure. A person with this degenerative disease suffers from rigidity and slowness in their movements, as well as tremors.
Eventually Emma started to avoid doing any writing or sketching because, “it didn’t feel worth it”, if the result was going to be something she didn’t want or couldn’t control. 1
But one fine day after 4 years, Emma meets a young computer scientist named Haiyan Zhang, who would eventually change Emma’s life.
During one of the meets, Emma attempts to draw a square, but that didn’t turn out as she wanted. All that did was remind her that Parkinson’s disease had robbed her of her lifelong love for drawing.
But Haiyan wanted to help. So, Emma asked her if she could help make her hand do what she wanted it to do or at least be able to sign her own name legibly.
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1. The Painful Trial And Error Period
In a video demonstration, Haiyan explained that this was a humongous challenge and would involve lots of experimenting before perfecting the most feasible solution.
But where was one even supposed to begin to help someone overcome such a specific neurological symptom so they can regain their ability to write or draw normally?
Haiyan started by experimenting with gadgets such as pantographs but with a pen (a mechanical device which copies a figure or plan but on a different scale) and added magnets around it to it so it would create an opposite force around a pen. But, when Emma tried it, she said it only increased the shaking, not lessen it.
Emma began to feel like she would not last in the graphic design industry, and her usual resilience and determination alone would not be enough to help her. Although she was never one to admit defeat, it was becoming hard to believe that Emma could regain her writing ability, especially after many failing experiments. 2
Emma and Haiyan began losing hope, but had not quite given up yet.
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2. When They Said, “Eureka!”
Haiyan continued to ponder over what else could be done. With the help of her team she started to look at her past projects where she had invented cutlery to help disabled people and also found out about those who had created vibrating spoons for those with Parkinson’s.
So turning to this everyday item, she came up with an idea.
Just as how the vibrating spoon helped counteract the tremors caused by Parkinson’s, Haiyan tried to figure out how she can create a wearable device for someone with Parkinson’s, which would vibrate opposite to how their hands shake. This way the two movements would cancel each other out and make their hands steady.
By using this tremor counteracting vibration-based idea, Haiyan made a rough prototype using some wires attached to tiny vibrating coin-cell motors which were all connected onto a board which was about the size of a handheld TV remote controller. The motors would then vibrate against the tremors of a person’s hand. In Haiyan’s own words, “It would basically short-circuit whatever feedback loop there is between the brain and the hand that’s causing the tremors.”
So, Haiyan tested this rough prototype on a lady with Parkinson’s, and it showed some improvement, as her writing was more fluid than shaky.
After a few more tweaks, that prototype was designed into a bespoke watch-like gadget to help Emma be able to write and draw thanks to the little vibrations the motors inside would generate.
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3. The Drumroll Moment
The device looked like a digital wristwatch and was controlled using a mobile app.
Haiyan strapped the device on Emma’s hand, and switched it on.
Emma started by writing her name, which came out beautifully in her old handwriting. She got emotional and said that it almost made her forget that she had any tremors. Emma then drew a perfect straight line, which she admitted she was not able to draw for a long time. It almost felt like her old hand again, as she drew those lines into the perfect jitter-free rectangle.
The invention is called the ‘Emma’, since it was invented for her, and the dial displayed Emma’s embedded signature as the brand insignia too.
Emma said in excitement that the device confused her brain and hand into not knowing what to do, so that resulted in stable and better writing.
Although this remarkable device used simple physics, to turn illegible into legible writing, it also helped Emma be able to make sketches that were presentable to a client.
[vs slide=”4″ slide_title=”Emma’s Hopes Are Back In Her Hands”]
4. Emma’s Hopes Are Back In Her Hands
Writing and drawing straight lines aside, Emma is now looking to see if this device can help her with other daily aspects of her life, such as texting on her mobile phone, which usually takes her 10 minutes to type and send because of her hand tremors. She hopes she can even cook, stitch and do more, without accidentally cutting her finger off. 3
Emma admitted that she’s a stubborn person, is glad that she has her future back in control of her hands again and can feel like nothing is impossible!
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5. The Future Of The ‘Emma’
Haiyan has currently not disclosed any plans about commercializing or making ‘The Emma’ into a mass market product. For now, she is happy to have designed and invented such a life-changing device to make life for Emma a lot easier and add to the existing medical groundwork for Parkinson’s. There is still a hope that others will follow-up on this and use this technology as a basis for further medical and technological development for Parkinson’s and other ailments.
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