Like a human hand
Sometimes the development of new technology makes such a difference to people’s lives that its impact is virtually immeasurable. Scottish-based company Touch Bionics recently won the prestigious 2008 Royal Academy of Engineering MacRobert Award for their development of a new bionic hand, the iLimb.

What marks out the iLimb from other prosthetic devices is that it looks and feels like a human hand. ‘What a great award it has been and I’m amazed how far around the world it has got,’ said Stuart Mead the company’s Chief Executive Officer. ‘We’ve had an enormous amount of publicity and congratulations from everywhere.’

New benchmark
The iLimb has only been available since September 2007, but already it is a benchmark for prosthetic technology. ‘If you see an existing electric hand,’ says Mead, ‘it really is one motor hand. The iLimb is effectively five-powered digits joined together into a hand.’ Electrodes on the surface of the skin pick up the electric signal created by the muscles on the patient’s limb, and the device uses this signal.

A lot of sophisticated technology is built into the device. ‘There is battery technology, motor technology, electronics, and a cosmesis, which acts and looks like human skin, so it has to be strong,’ explains Mead. The technology needs to be supple in order to replicate a real hand, yet more durable ’because there’s no pain feedback, it has to be extremely robust and it has to be lightweight so that it is comfortable to wear.’

Origins
The company itself is a recent offshoot of the Scottish National Health Service, but as Mead explains, the iLimb technology has its origins much earlier. ‘You can trace it right the way back to 1963 and Thalidomide‘, explains Mead. Thalidomide was a morning sickness drug prescribed for pregnant women, which resulted in some babies being born with severe disabilities affecting their limbs. ‘The government set up funds to look after these children as they grew up. This technology came out of this NHS support.’ Most of all, users of the bionic limb talk about the psychological confidence it gives them as much as its practical ease of use.