iClip
I served as leader of a group of three fellow engineering students as we designed a nail-clipping solution for people with spinal cord injuries at the Shirley Ryan AbilityLab in Chicago. Our solution, the iClip, was successfully used by people recovering from spinal cord injuries, and it helped them gain independence.
As lead, I learned many leadership skills while guiding our team towards our end goal and ensuring that we stayed on our timeline. Throughout the ten week design cycle, we prototyped solutions, conducted user testing, and wrote a research paper on our findings.
The Process:
The first half of our timeline involved researching spinal cord injuries and interviewing potential users to create accurate design constraints and requirements that we could judge our prototypes with.
Rapid prototyping allowed our group to create multiple designs and preform rigorous testing to ensure safe operation before getting feedback from patients at the Shirley Ryan AbilityLab. With this feedback, we finalized our design direction and created a final prototype that successfully allowed clients to clip their nails safely and independently.
Our Product:
The iClip utilizes a machined aluminum base with magnets imbedded around the outer edge to allow users to move the clipper around their nail to trim the edges without needing fine motor control in their fingers. From our user testing and extensive research of spinal cord injuries, we determined that this was an important feature and allowed for users to safely clip their nails.
Our specific user, a young adult who recently suffered a spinal cord injury in a bike accident, successfully used the clippers at our final design presentation and talked about the independence it provided him.
Skills Learned:
Managing a group and creating an environment where everyone feels respected and can contribute fully
Developing a timeline and ensuring project stays on track with Gantt chart
Process of prototyping and user testing concluding in a working final product