Assistive technology refers to any software or hardware that acts to assist and improve the functional capabilities of people with disabilities. Examples include wheelchairs, prosthetics, voice-to-text technology, and text-to-speech technology.
Introduction
Assistive innovation (AT) alludes to “assistive items and related frameworks and administrations created for individuals to keep up with or work on working and consequently advance well-being”. It permits individuals with handicaps to live free, solid, and useful lives partaking in training, work, and social activities. AT decreases the weight on guardians and the requirement for formal well-being and backing administrations. Without AT, individuals with handicaps are much of the time trapped in a pattern of rejection, confinement, and neediness, which further increments handicap and morbidity.
Needs
One billion individuals overall need assistive innovation to carry on with solid, useful, and noble existences. In spite of the fact that AT can be utilized all through life expectancy, the need is most prominent for the old, individuals living with persistent circumstances, and individuals with disabilities. Of those people living with a handicap, 1 out of 10 is children. As the total populace ages and the predominance of non-transferable illnesses builds, the requirement for voluntarily proceeds rises. The people who expect AT should have the option to get to it to take part in training, work, and family and local area life. Getting to AT in low-asset nations can be troublesome on account of issues with reasonableness, accessibility, and acceptability.
Kinds of AT
Assistive advancements incorporate any item, piece of gear or thing used to keep up with, improve or expand the practical capacity of individuals with disabilities. Assistive items can be made, changed, or bought. Assistive gadgets range from straightforward, low-innovation gadgets (for example sticks), to complicated, high-innovation gadgets (for example mechanized wheelchairs, discourse-produced gadgets on computers). The video above by the World Wellbeing Association exhibits the advantages of assistive innovation.
Classes
Since there is a wide assortment of assistive gadgets, it is helpful to bunch them in various categories.[8] A few items will squeeze into more than one category.[7]
Versatility Items:
Help with: Versatility
Gadgets: props, walkers, wheelchairs, slopes, and get bars
Seeing/Vision Items:
Help with: low vision or visual impairment range
Gadgets: bifocals, magnifiers, sound players, talking and/or contacting watches/books, braille frameworks
Hearing Items:
Help with: hearing misfortune and communication[8]
Gadgets include: portable amplifiers and alert signalers that utilization light, sound, and vibration
Correspondence Items:
Help with: augmentative and elective communication[8]
Gadgets include: correspondence sheets, books, and cards
Insight Items:
Help with: cognition
Gadgets: pill coordinators and whiteboards to recall things
Taking care of oneself and Climate Items:
Help: individuals with actual debilitations who experience issues with utilitarian exercises
Gadgets: latrine and shower seats, permeable materials
Need Assistive Item Rundown
The World Wellbeing Association made the Need Assistive Items Rundown (APL) to further develop admittance to assistive items. This rundown incorporates 50 need assistive items in light of far-reaching needs and effects of the client’s life. The APL incorporates both innovative and low-tech items to help with portability, correspondence, cognizance, individual consideration, vision, hearing, and climate. The rundown isn’t prohibitive; the point is to furnish part states with a model from which to foster their own public need assistive items list as per public need and accessible resources.[9] [10]
The accompanying rundown by the World Wellbeing Organization[8] subtleties the 50 need items. Kindly note that it ought not to be considered restrictive:[11]
Arrangement of Assistive Innovation
There are four stages expected for the arrangement of assistive innovation:
Select
Fit
Instruct
Follow-up
Each of the four cycles helps to guarantee that AT is utilized really. The initial step includes picking the item to help with the client’s necessities. This cycle is finished as a team with the patient and guardian to comprehend their requirements and how they will utilize the item inside their current circumstance. The fitting system gives a chance to change and adjust the item to the person. Educating includes making sense of, showing, and rehearsing with the AT. Finally, follow-up is vital to decide whether the assistive gadget is as yet addressing the client’s necessities and on the off chance that any support or fixes are required.[12] The accompanying video by the World Wellbeing Association makes sense of these four stages in more detail: