The Invent Health Initiative: Hardware Innovations Hard at Work

By Susannah Fox

As a part of our invent health blog series, we’re featuring examples of hardware innovations — both new as well as those improving or finding new uses for physical objects that already exist — that have helped enable people to live more independently, in better health, and with greater dignity.

Today we’re featuring examples of assistive devices for cooking and eating.

For example, people with hand tremor are often unable to keep food on a fork or spoon. An inventor created — and tested with the support of a grant from the National Institutes of Health — an assistive device that counteracts the tremor, allowing people living with conditions such as Parkinsons to feed themselves.

Cooking is another challenge that can be overcome for people living with disability. The Amputee Coalition is a nonprofit organization that educates people about how to navigate the kitchen using adapted tools such as spring-loaded scissors, L-shaped knives, and single-handed cutting boards.

Share with us: When have you seen examples of hardware innovations improving someone’s ability to cook or eat? Tell us your story if you’ve ever created an assistive device or improved upon existing technology that made someone’s everyday tasks — once an impossibility — now accessible.

Originally published at medium.com on April 7, 2016.