Cowan, D.

Cudd, P.

Judge, S.

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Technology and Disability

Over a Decade of Developing the Assistive Technology Field in the UK

White Rose Research Online

Technology and Disability 27 (2015) 1–3 1DOI 10.3233/TAD-150428IOS PressGuest EditorialOver a Decade of Developing the AssistiveTechnology Field in the UKThis special issue mainly presents papers from theUK RAATE (Recent Advances in Assistive Technol-ogy and Engineering) conference 2013 held at War-wick University. The previous Technology and Disabil-ity issue contains one paper; another paper has beenadded herein through the usual route.The RAATE conference is a long-standing annualUK conference focusing on assistive technology, withthe inaugural event in 2001. Many of the proceedingsfrom previous years of this conference can be foundon the Health Design and Technology Institute (HDTI)hosted website (http://www.raate.org.uk). Looking atthe development of this conference suggests trends inthe development of the disciplines, technology and ser-vices related to assistive technology.RAATE began life as RARE (Recent Advances inRehabilitation Engineering) an annual event for (reha-bilitation) engineers with a focus on wheelchairs andseating, the equipment area in which most rehabilita-tion engineers worked. Like many other single disci-pline meetings other types of assistive technology werereported at RARE but to a very limited extent. The con-ference was originally hosted by the Centre of Reha-bilitation Engineering based at Kings College London.It has since been hosted by the Institute of Physics andEngineering in Medicine (IPEM) and most recently byHDTI which is part of Coventry University.RAATE developed as the importance of assistivetechnology emerged in supporting people with disabil-ities and the increasing aging population and the rangeof assistive technology (AT) being used began to in-crease. Rehabilitation engineers, in common with otherdisciplines, needed to develop and expand their knowl-edge and expertise to better meet their service users’needs. The purpose of RAATE was to “bring AT pro-fessionals together” and so RARE became RAATE andthe doors were opened to therapists, doctors, teach-ers, carers and academics alike. At the same time newprofessional roles of clinical scientists, clinical tech-nologists within the health sector and assistive tech-nologists within the education sector were being de-veloped which were transforming the professional de-velopment pathways and training. The common themethus became the subject of AT instead of the profes-sional discipline. The name was also chosen to reflectthe European organisation AAATE (The Associationfor the Advancement of Assistive Technology in Eu-rope) which promotes research and development of as-sistive technology – not least through this journal.The need to develop this multi-professional forumreflected the fragmented nature of AT delivery in theUK. Here equipment services are fragmented tendingto work in isolation. For example many wheelchair andseating services are separate from any other type ofequipment provision. Yet many wheelchair users alsouse communication aids, telecare, environmental con-trols and need access to computers. The organisingcommittee wanted different disciplines and services tobe able to meet and learn about each other’s areas ofexpertise. The early programmes reflected this with in-put from services around the country explaining theirmodels of service and “Beginners Guide” sessions of-fered to all on different areas of assistive technology.An early development of RAATE was the AT Fo-rum, a group with representation from all the profes-sional organisations, service providers, charities anduser groups in the UK involved in or using AT. TheAT Forum produced an influential position paper in2014 (http://www.fastuk.org/fastdocuments/atf_3.pdf)on the provision of assistive technology in the UK.This paper identified issues, drivers for change and keyareas of work that needed to be undertaken in order totake forward and realise the full potential of assistivetechnology.ISSN 1055-4181/15/$35.00 c© 2015 – IOS Press and the authors. All rights reserved2 Guest EditorialInitially, RAATE was an entirely ‘practitioner’ ledevent – tending to present case studies, service devel-opments and technology developments, but not for-mal research findings. This is another theme of the de-velopment of this conference, ultimately evidenced inthe quality of the papers contained in this special is-sue. FAST (the Foundation for Assistive Technology)joined the organising committee 2008 and was oneof the drivers for this change. FASTs involvement al-lowed RAATE to tap into the wide range of researchin AT across the UK (and Europe) as FAST was com-missioned by the Department of Health to produce anannual parliamentary report on research into AT in theUK. Sadly, last year saw the end of the Departmentof Health commissioning however we are hopeful thatFAST can continue to contribute and support the fieldof AT.Dissemination of research knowledge has also beenkey to RAATE and the keynote speakers have beenhighly influential in this and encouraging an evidencebased approach within the field. Keynote speakers haveincluded many who have made significant contribu-tions to the field of assistive technology, such as Mar-cia Scherer who developed the Matching People toTechnology assessment method, Martin Fergusson Pellwho founded and directed the Centre for Rehabilita-tion Technology in New York and Jeff Jutai who de-veloped the Psycho-social Impact of Assistive Devicesoutcome measure (PIADS). We have also had the op-portunity of hearing from those who use assistive tech-nology – most recently from Kate Allatt, who surviveda brain stem stroke (http://www.kateallatt.com/). Thesekeynote speakers have given frank and critical opinionson what works and what does not and the impact thatthe equipment and the support they are offered makesto their life.Our delegate lists have also changed. Where oncethey were predominantly service personnel there is anow wider spread including research institutions andalso companies who take part in assistive technologydevelopment. We are grateful to our colleagues in themanufacturing and supply industries who regularly at-tend and support this event – highlighting the crucialrole they play in the picture of AT provision. Whilethere has been a loose connection between the AAATEand RAATE this has grown with a regular presenceof the AAATE at RAATE in the last few years. Per-haps co-incidentally there has been a small but increas-ing involvement of non-UK speakers and delegates.It would be good to think such ties between nationalAT meetings and the AAATE could be developed in astronger way across the whole of Europe.Looking at the past content of RAATE shows howdifferent themes emerge over time – these can bedriven by the research ongoing in academic institutes,charities, companies and services alike; through ex-ternal influences such as the growing need to supportolder people to remain safe and independent in theirown homes; or by programmes of work directed byGovernment such as the early introduction of telecareservices through to the latest changes in NHS Special-ist Commissioning which has seen the establishment ofCommunication Aid services and the further develop-ment of Environmental Control Services. We thereforehave the opportunity annually to report on the health ofAT services around our country and beyond and reportmore widely on factors that will impact on them.We continue to invite research, service issues/deve-lopments, case studies, technology developments andnew products from manufacturers to be presented atRAATE. The selection presented in this special issue istypical in highlighting the diversity and quality of theUK assistive technology research field.Bentley and colleagues [1] revisited the reasons whytelecare is still not being adopted as much as wouldseem desirable. They highlighted that on many frontsthe reasons are unchanged from previous work on thetopic, suggesting that innovation responding to the bar-riers has not occurred.Ward and colleagues discuss the use of a co-creationmethodology in the context of consumer telecare ser-vice design. They highlight the fact that the increas-ing ubiquity of smart phones, computer tablets andolder people who employ such technologies has cre-ated the opportunity to offer a consumer solution toaugment/enable family and friends support. Such solu-tions have the potential to really change if not improvesupport available to those who need and want it.Ahanathapillai and her co-authors discuss the designand functioning of a wrist worn technology and digitalservice to monitor wellbeing and daily activities par-ticularly for older people with long term conditions.Such technologies can straddle the consumer and med-ical market and raise questions about are they assistiveor rehabilitative technologies at all. However a primafacia case can be made that anything that allows anolder person – who has lessened functional capabili-ties through any cause – to choose to remain at homeliving independently can be considered assistive. Re-habilitation/behaviour change capacity will depend onthe long term conditions involved and how the serviceutilises the technology.Attempting to provide consumer based solutions re-quires that those who select them have good informa-Guest Editorial 3tion to inform those choices. Holliday and co-authorshave targeted one specific instance typically consid-ered as within telecare, namely fall detectors. Theyfound that no users, professionals nor end users , couldaccess the required information to help them appropri-ately choose when to employ fall detectors or not.The final paper is quite different. From Redhead andMandy we have a study to examine if improved de-signs of one arm operated manual wheelchairs is nec-essary. They observed EMG activity in six musclessurrounding the shoulder joint during propulsion by17 non-disabled users. The study employed more thanone chair designed for one arm propulsion. They con-clude that user fatigue could occur during use of thesewheelchairs, and that the next step is to repeat the studywith real end users.The included papers are somewhat typical in theirprofile in that there is a dominance of digital technol-ogy – in part this is because of its flexibility but avail-able funding also has a lot to do with it.The paper not from RAATE, by Jeanvoine et al.,is much more mathematical in its content than any ofthe above. It explores various techniques aiming to im-prove phoneme recognition in binaural cochlear im-plants. Preliminary results have some potential but re-quire appropriate implant users – and it concluded thatnoise reduction in an adverse environment is still to beresolved.Guest EditorsDonna Cowan, Simon Judge and Peter Cudd∗∗University of SheffieldRegent Court, Regent StreetSheffield S1 4DA, UKTel.: +44 114 222 0879E-mail: p.cudd@sheffield.ac.ukReference[1] Bentley CL, Powell LA, Orrell A, Mountain GA, Addressingdesign and suitability barriers to Telecare use: Has anythingchanged? Technology and Disability 2014; 26(4): 221-35.

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Over a Decade of Developing the Assistive Technology Field in the UK

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