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Media Release

Jun 11 2008

All gold for UniSA student-designed crutches

Michael Ng with his award-winning crutchesObserving a friend struggle with forearm crutches after sustaining an ankle injury was the motivation for Michael Ng to develop award-winning functional walking aids for his major final year project in UniSA’s Bachelor of Industrial Design degree program.

Ng was named the Gold Winner of the Australian International Design Awards – Dyson Student Award as the highest national achiever in the competition for 2008 for a compact crutch designed to improve comfort and reduce the detrimental health effects associated with long-term use.

“I enjoy designing functional products as I generally find them more challenging but I also love how design can be used to positively influence people’s lives. This project was a great opportunity to tackle a real-life problem that could potentially benefit a huge number of people,” Ng said.

“Traditional forearm crutches are rigid, unnatural and uncomfortable. As they strike the ground, harmful shock and vibration are transmitted through the frame and absorbed by the body of the user, causing repetitive jarring, which results in soreness and numbing of hands and wrists, elbow and shoulder joint pain, wrist tendonitis and carpal tunnel syndrome,” Ng said.

Current crutch designs aid walking by increasing stability, enlarging the support base and reducing the weight on the lower limbs, but do not take into account human factors associated with their use. Ng identified the main ergonomic, functional and usability issues with current designs, as expressed by their users, and proposed effective solutions to overcome them.

“I addressed the shock absorption problem by designing a crutch tip compressor that isolates the frame from the ground, enabling rubber crutch tips to absorb the impact. Inspired by prosthetics limbs, my design allows the crutch tips to roll and behave like ankle joints, accommodating uneven ground and increasing the contact area to maximise grip and stability, and absorb impact without bottoming out. Large angled handgrips provide a more natural wrist angle that promotes a wider grip and distributes the load over a greater area of the palms, improving blood circulation and reducing pressure on the carpal tunnel,” Ng said.

The ability to collapse the crutches into a compact size for transport or when seated makes them more manageable to live with.

Lecturer in UniSA’s Louis Laybourne-Smith School of Architecture and Design, Sandy Walker said that Ng’s design was a stand-out project, despite the extra challenges of having to juggle his study commitments with family life.

“Even though Ng hadn’t finished his degree, the quality of his work spoke for itself. Hills Industries identified him as someone they wanted in their team,” Walker said.

“Ng’s award brings UniSA’s tally of industrial design awards to one gold, two silver and one bronze in the six years since the national competition began, which is quite a coup for the quality of UniSA’s industrial design program and the high calibre of its students,” he said.

Ng, who aims to finish his university studies this year, describes his degree as “a well-rounded program that represents four years of extremely hard work and lots of sacrifices, but also acceptance into the design community from my more mature and experienced peers, which means a great deal to me”.

Now an industrial designer in the Home, Hardware and Eco Products Division for Hills Industries, Ng is assisting with the design, detailing and documentation of products, mostly clothes lines and play gyms.

“At this stage in my career everything is new and challenging and I want to get a good overall grasp of the industry with the aim of becoming a well-rounded designer. I like to be constantly challenged and enjoy the creative experience that is unique to industrial design.”

Ng’s award includes a trophy, $10,000 trip to the United Kingdom to compete in the James Dyson Award plus $4000, courtesy of Dyson Appliances (Australia), a Dyson vacuum cleaner, inclusion in the ADA exhibition, acknowledgement at the Australian International Design Awards, career assistance, industry exposure and referrals, and media coverage.

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