Space Requirements for Wheeled Mobility - University at Buffalo ...

More documents

Recommendations

Info

• Because environments are not standardized in their level of accommodation towheeled mobility needs, individuals who use wheeled mobility aids adapt by,for example, owning more than one wheeled-mobility device. On averagewheeled mobility users have two devices and 50% of wheeled mobility usersalso use a walker.• The U.S. Access Board has played an important role in ensuring that theAMSE A18 standard appropriately addresses the needs of those who requirelifts.• The increasing size and weights associated with newer powered mobilitydevices need to be considered in design standards.• While use of platform lifts has vastly improved accessibility to the builtenvironment, their operation can be difficult and time consuming. Efforts needto be devoted to universal design alternatives that eliminate the need for lifts.Demographics of Wheeled Mobility Users• There are approximately 2 million users of wheeled mobility users, and. trendssuggest that this number may exceed 4 million users by 2010. This growth islikely due to changing social and technological trends, such as improvementsin the design of mobility aids, improved accessibility to devices, and socialacceptance of device use, rather than an increased prevalence of disability orthe number of elderly people.• The effects of the growing aging population on the use of wheeled mobilitydevices are uncertain due, in part, to the limitations in the current nationalsurvey methods. However, those 65 and over make up 56% of the users ofwheeled mobility aids, and are more likely to use manual versus poweredmobility devices.• There are higher overall proportions of women who use wheeled mobilitydevices, particularly among the elderly. However, the number of male usersexceeds the number of women users among younger adults.• The device and environmental needs of wheeled mobility users in health carefacilities will need careful consideration in the future. When compared to nonwheeledmobility aid users, people who use wheeled mobility devices aremuch more likely to report poor health (40% compared to 2%), a greaterfrequency of hospitalization and more frequent use of health care services.The most frequently reported building needs are usable doors and elevators,lifts and chair lifts for stairs.Space Requirements for Wheeled Mobility 10
• Revisions to the national surveys are needed to improve the quality and detailof information collected related to the frequency and severity disability andselection of assistive technologies. For example, the last NHIS-D survey didnot distinguish between powered or manual wheeled mobility-aid users.Additionally, national surveys do not inquire about why a particular device wasselected and what alternatives were considered.• The research community and sponsors are strongly encouraged to ensure theinformation about those with mobility impairments remains a priority and isimproved in future survey efforts.• A registry of wheeled mobility users could be developed from the surveyrespondents, provided that the appropriate consent could be obtained. Such aregistry could provide a value resource for future surveys designed to capturedetailed information about barriers in design and factors that affect theselection of wheeled mobility devices.Human Modeling of Mobility Aid Use• Digital human modeling packages such as HADRIAN are powerful design toolsin which a design can be evaluated against the body sizes and capabilities of“whole” virtual individuals rather than individual dimensions (an importantlimitation of conventional anthropometric data use). Based on the structuraland functional anthropometric data, designers can test virtual tasks in virtualenvironments to determine the percentage of individuals who have the abilityto complete a task in the specific context of the environment.• An automated prescriptive system for code-checking can be an extremelyvaluable design tool, but requires the designer to more completely define theobjects in CAD models. The International Alliance of Interoperability (IAI) hasprovided a framework for defining sets of objects called Industry FoundationClasses (IFC’s) that support this object-oriented approach.• While digital human models and computer simulations are useful in design, it isnot clear if use of such tools will be of great value to the regulators. Typically,the design questions do not require the level of detail provided by digitalhuman models and simulations. Further discussion is needed to explore howdigital human modeling and simulation methods can be used effectively incode development.• Additionally, digital human models are only useful if they are validated.Usually only components of the models (e.g., posture prediction for specifictasks) are evaluated, and there is not very much information about the errorsassociated with using digital human models in design.Anthropometric ResearchSpace Requirements for Wheeled Mobility 11
Page 4: Table of ContentsExecutive Summary
Page 8 and 9: • "Virtual reality and full scale
Page 13 and 14: • Overall, the preliminary resear
Page 15 and 16: IntroductionGuidelines and other do
Page 17 and 18: Guidelines and StandardsAnthropomet
Page 19 and 20: This paper and presentation describ
Page 21 and 22: Anthropometric Research in Australi
Page 23 and 24: Trends and Issues in TechnologiesTr
Page 25 and 26: DiscussionDiscussions focused on th
Page 27 and 28: Demographics of Wheeled Mobility Us
Page 29 and 30: DiscussionThe discussions focused o
Page 31 and 32: effectively still remain. The syste
Page 33 and 34: and code officials need answered do
Page 35 and 36: design, differences in inclusion cr
Page 37 and 38: esearch project, but, it includes a
Page 39 and 40: 1. Partner with other sponsors in t
Page 41 and 42: ReferencesBradtmiller, Anthropometr
Page 43 and 44: PresidentAnthrotech503 Xenia Ave.Ye
Page 45 and 46: Mr. Patrick J. F. HurleyIBOT Qualif
Page 47 and 48: Ms. Marsha MazzAssociate ProfessorS
Page 49 and 50: Ms. Hope ReedAccess SpecialistANSI

Space Requirements for Wheeled Mobility - University at Buffalo ...

You also want an ePaper? Increase the reach of your titles

Delete template?

Save as template?