Any fans of Glee will have had an undeniable teary moment when watching Monday’s show “A Very Glee Christmas” when wheelchair-bound Artie had a walk round the rehearsal room in the Israeli designed ReWalk.
The ReWalk is the ARGO Medical Technologies’ flagship of innovative development for walking restoration devices for people with lower limb disabilities. The product offers an alternative to wheelchair users, enabling paralysed people to stand, walk, and even climb stairs.
The ReWalk is a wearable, motorised quasi robotic suit that provides user-initiated mobility. Through leveraging advanced motion sensors, some sophisticated robotic control algorithms, on-board computers, real-time software, actuation motors, some composite materials, and good old fashion rechargeable batteries, the ReWalk creates movement through subtle changes in the user’s centre of gravity and upper-body movements.
There have been suggestions that this could truly represent the one-stop product for patients with lower limb disabilities in the future - no more need for stair lifts, bed winches and standing devices.
As the Re Walk costs over $100k – it stretches the bounds of believability somewhat that a US high school football coach could pop down to the shops and pick one up, as per Glee, but that is surely a great aspiration for the future. And we should give some credit to the show’s producers for bringing new healthcare technology to such a wide audience.
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