I watched a Ted Talk titled "Simple hacks for life with
Parkinson's" by Mileha Soneji. She begins her talk by noting that one
of her favorite memories of going to family gatherings was hanging out and
playing with her uncle who was always energized and the life of the
party. Sadly, he was diagnosed with Parkinson's disease, a disease that
causes degeneration of the nervous system. This was a confident,
powerful, and independent man whose body started to deteriorate after the onset
of this disease. She notes that just to make a turn with his walker, he had to
shuffle and take multiple steps to turn himself around. She touches on how
his personality changed because of this disease, he did not feel like
himself and was less likely to engage because of how different his
demeanor was with the disease (i.e. tremors).
She then goes on to say that her aim is not to cure Parkinson's, because she realizes that she is not capable of doing that on her own, but to help make their everyday tasks easier. First, she invented a no spill cup for people that are uncomfortable with drinking tea or coffee in public, her design was able to keep the liquid inside of the cup despite a person having a tremor. This was very important to her uncle because he stop drinking anything in public because he was too embarrassed with his tremors.
Next, she decided to observe him in his home and try to see what he struggled with the most. It struck her that her uncle was having trouble walking on flat ground but had no problem walking up stairs. She found that this was the case because it was a continuous motion. She then created a stair case solution that allowed her uncle to walk quicker on flat ground. She notes that what people need to be focused on are human-centered solutions.
This Ted Talk is so on point with OT values! I loved how client-centered her approach was. Sometime I am intimated by the amount of technology out there and I feel like I will not be able to help people to the best of my abilities; but, this reminded me that as long as we are client centered it can be low tech and still be beneficial to the client as long as we keep them in mind. I also loved that the way she figured out this problem was by observing her uncle. She took the time to slow down and watch. This is something that I sometimes forget to do but is so vital in our career. Going forward, I want to remember to keep the client first, observe the client, and be bold enough to create something that will help them.
Reference: Soneji, M. (n.d.). Simple hacks for life with Parkinson's. Retrieved from https://www.ted.com/talks/mileha_soneji_simple_hacks_for_life_with_parkinson_s#t-366783
