I have an acquaintance who is legally blind. Recently she’s been trying to find a device that she could attach to her rolling walker that would alert her when it was about to hit an obstacle, kind of like the collision alert on newer vehicles. The closest device that I’ve been able to come up with in my searching has been a suitcase made to help the visually impaired navigate airports, and all the references to that are seven years old, which makes me think it was a failed product.
There’s a cool product, Glide (a kind of rolling cane that acts as a virtual guide dog), that is not yet on the market, but she’s elderly and needs the support of the walker. I found studies talking about the possible utility of such devices, but I haven’t found an actual product available for purchase. I was even looking at garage parking aids to try to find a proximity sensor that might be repurposed, but saw nothing promising.
It seems like a thing that should exist. The tech seems to be there. But I can’t find it. Can anyone point me to an actual device, a better direction in which to search or a possible alternative solution?
Possibly relevant: She owns a pair of Meta Glasses. I’m not really familiar with their capabilities but they do provide environmental feedback which might prove useful in this situation. Haven’t been able to find a specific application though.
I’m reminded of some clever bumpers worn by blind dogs. They resemble a large football facemask and let Fido move around and sniff stuff without as many unexpected collisions.
I’m seeing a some ‘smart canes’ and wheelchairs and other things, with or without (but mostly with) AI. I also see a research paper that mentions a walker but I’m not seeing any easily affordable and accessible anything, but it looks like it’s on the horizon.
If you know anyone that likes to tinker with electronics and coding, I would imagine they could set up an arduino with some ultrasonic sensors (or cameras or LIDAR etc) and program it to make a noise when they’re within X feet of an obstacle. Technically you’d probably also need some accelerators it knows where the alerting sensors are, which way they’re pointed/tilted, but even without that, I think you could probably make it work without too much trouble.
I saw those but I’m guessing someone that needs a walker is going to be able to hold a stick out in front of themself. If they were cheap enough, I could see mounting the guts of it on a walker though.
Thanks for the replies. @Joey_P is correct about the cane being a no go, though the tech in those things seems to be exactly what she’s looking for.
The BuzzClip device @Reply linked to looks promising. I don’t think clipping it on the walker would work because of the way it delivers feedback, but wearing it would seem to provide what she’s looking for. I’ll definitely pass that lead along to her. Appreciate the help.
