• Journal of the Korean housing association
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• v.26 no.4
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• pp.45-53
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• 2015

The concept of universal design has become an essential requirement for environmental design, due to the growing population of the aged, and the increasing needs of people with disabilities. This study aims to propose a universal design guideline for apartment housing units that can be adapted to both a general household and a household with elderly or disabled individuals. This design process encompasses literary reviews, and includes the measurements of the dimensions and facilities of currently available apartment housing. The three domestic universal guidelines were reviewed, and a universal design checklist for apartment housing units was developed. Afterward, the individual elements and inclusive factors of universal design, for apartment housing units, were collected and examined according to the each functional space within the home. The results and conclusions are as follows: 1) The factors of universal design are diversified by the division of the functional spaces within the home, such as the private space, the work space and the entertaining space. 2) Due to the lack of space and storage, wheelchairs cannot be used in most currently available apartment types; this problem can be resolved by applying flexibility and optional adaptation. The solutions for the above are additional design factors that will enable more convenient usage and elaborate design.

• Journal of Institute of Control, Robotics and Systems
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• v.17 no.7
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• pp.674-684
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• 2011

More and more elderly and disabled people are using electric scooters instead of electric wheelchairs because of higher mobility. However, people with high levels of impairment or the elderly still have difficulties in driving the electric scooters safely. Semi-autonomous electric scooter system is one of the solutions for the safety: Either manual driving or autonomous driving can be used selectively. In this paper, we implement a semi-autonomous electric scooter system with functions of localization and path following. In order to recognize the pose of electric scooter in outdoor environments, we design an outdoor localization system based on the extended Kalman filter using DGPS (Differential Global Positioning System) and wheel encoders. We added an accelerometer to make the localization system adaptable to road condition. Also we propose a path following algorithm using two arcs with current pose of the electric scooter and a given path in the map. Simulation results are described to show that the proposed algorithms provide the ability to drive an electric scooter semi-autonomously. Finally, we conduct outdoor experiments to reveal the practicality of the proposed system.

• Proceedings of the KSME Conference
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• 2001.06c
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• pp.464-469
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• 2001

This work provides the biomechanical evaluations of a manual wheelchair with a bi-directional driving system. The new propulsion strategy can be accomplished by employing a special gear system that converts the oscillatory motion of a handrim into the unidirectional output motion of a wheel. A main feature of the forward. backward propulsion is to supply continuous driving torque without break. Motion. analysis has been performed through 2-dimensional image processing for measuring the kinematic properties of the upper arm and fore arm. Then, the inverse dynamics analysis has been done for obtaining the joint torques, the handrim forces and input/output powers. Results show that the output power by the forward. reverse propulsion is almost twice as much as that by conventional propulsion. Also, the new propulsion is expected to reduce the fatigues and injuries at arm joints by employing more muscle groups for movement. In conclusion, the forward. reverse propulsion can greatly improve the performances of manual wheelchairs by providing better mobility as well as by guaranteeing several advantages from a biomechanical viewpoint. Future development of a manual wheelchair optimized for the bi-directional propulsion will further improve the propulsion performances.

• Journal of the Korean Society of Manufacturing Technology Engineers
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• v.22 no.1
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• pp.92-99
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• 2013

The ratio of mobility handicapped was 12,110,000 in late 2009 about 24.4% of total population. The number of handicapped population is increasing continuously due to traffic accidents and industrial disasters. Therefore, the purpose of this research is to suggest a design for passengers on wheelchairs to get into and off to raise handicapped or elderly people's right of mobility. The scope of this research is mobility handicapped especially wheelchair passengers who use vans, small buses, and trains. The ramp design of vans is module form. The ramp is moved with screw jack and guides are installed on each side to increase stability. Moreover, a bridge was installed for smooth getting in and off of the van. The ramp design for small bus is lowed by 200m in order not to have obstacle such as speed bump when getting in or off. In order to reduce vulnerable environment and administration, air slide cylinder was chosen. Lastly, for the ramp design of train, the principle of link was used that the simpler structure made the weight lighter and installation in the train became easier. If we look at the conjugation condition of heterogeneous materials to produce a ramp, proper welding condition for cold steel plate and stainless plate is 3kW output and 3-5m/min of welding speed using laser beam seems proper.

• 한국HCI학회:학술대회논문집
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• 2009.02a
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• pp.552-557
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• 2009

In this paper, we propose hybrid navigation system, for obstacle detection and avoidance in Intelligent wheelchairs (IWs). To robustly detect obstacles and avoid them on various environments, hybrid navigation system combines both range-sensor and camera information. For this, 10 range-sensors (2 ultrasonic and 8 infra-red sensors) and CCD camera are used. Through processing the informations obtained from those sensors, our system can detect obstacles with various sizes and shapes, and then avoid them. To assess the effectiveness of the proposed hybrid navigation system, it was tested on complex environments including various obstacles, then the results showed the potential of our system as mobility aids for disabled people.

• The Journal of the Korea institute of electronic communication sciences
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• v.14 no.6
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• pp.1181-1186
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• 2019

Recently, we have been able to quickly order and pay with kiosks even at fast food restaurants, small private restaurants and cafes. However, people with disabilities who are uncomfortable with their arms and who are sitting in wheelchairs are difficult to use by pressing graphical buttons to use kiosks. Older people also feel uncomfortable to use kiosks because of their cognitive abilities to accept new information as they get older. In this paper, to solve this problem, we design and implement a order-payment system to add the voice command element of the AI speaker to the visual command element when the user interacts with the kiosk.

• Journal of the Korea Academia-Industrial cooperation Society
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• v.15 no.9
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• pp.5738-5743
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• 2014

This paper evaluated an electric wheelchair control algorithm by slope recognition on uneven terrain. Nowadays, the population using wheelchair has been increasing rapidly due to increases in the elderly population. On the other hand, most wheelchairs are directly controlled by the user without any device capable of securing the safety of the user. This causes difficulties in wheelchair control from the influence of gravity on the slope. This paper proposes a vehicle control algorithm that can move a wheelchair similar to moving on a plane. At that time, sensors are not used to recognize the degree of the slope. All processes were verified by simulation.

• International journal of advanced smart convergence
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• v.9 no.3
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• pp.199-206
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• 2020

A wheelchair is an essential rehabilitation assistant device for the movement of paraplegia patients and generally paralyzed patients who cannot walk normally. In particular, the applicability of the manual/motorized wheelchair is gradually increasing. Until now, decelerators using belt, chain and worm gears, etc have been widely used. However, a decelerator takes a large space although it is a simple device and thus is not ideal for the driving part of manual/motorized wheelchair. For these reasons, in this study we developed a driving part producing a large driving force through a decelerator using planetary gears rather than conventional worm gear-based decelerator. We designed the tooth profile of the planetary gears for decelerator using Kisssoft program, In addition, we designed the driving part so as to apply it to the wheels of conventional wheelchairs, and then optimized the mechanism for the principles of manual/motorized transposition of the driving part and the operational principles. Based on the results of this study, we finally designed and manufactured a driving part for wheelchair decelerator in the form of planetary gears with 1 sun gear, 2 planetary gears and 1 ring gear.

• Journal of the Korean housing association
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• v.20 no.5
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• pp.41-50
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• 2009

This case study is an effort to provide new knowledge on the U.S. elderly public housing focusing on the residents' perceptions of the environmental conditions. For this study, we conducted a survey using written questionnaires and interviews with 20 residents who rent in Columbia, MO. The recorded interview data was used for final analysis; primary findings are as follows: The residents reported relatively high satisfaction on their overall environmental conditions in the two target public housing, built in 1950s. As the most significant problem, residents perceive the lack of storage space for individual units, Partially attributed to space limitations. In addition, bathroom needs varied dramatically among residents based on their health and whether wheelchairs are used. Therefore, it was found that instead of standardized bathrooms, a customizable configuration for the resident's unique physical condition and accessibility must be considered. The residents also addressed their concerns about security for entrance and foyer areas. Due to the small living areas, they wanted to have available outdoor public space for various social activities. Furthermore, they reported the need for small social gathering areas while friends and family members are visiting them, in addition to their small living units, which average 49.8 sq. ft. each.

• Physical Therapy Korea
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• v.10 no.1
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• pp.139-158
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• 2003

This study evaluated the community-based rehabilitation services provided by the Wonju Public Health Center from Jan. 2000 to Dec. 2002. Ninety-four persons with disabilities dwelling in the community participated and the surveys were completed in an interview during home visits. The respondents' demographic, socio-economic, and medical characteristics, rehabilitation service received, willingness to receive home-visit rehabilitation services, and satisfaction with the rehabilitation services were analyzed by frequency and percentage. A Likert scoring system consisting of five agreement-disagreement categories was applied to each item, consisting of Very Satisfied, Satisfied, So-So, Poorly Satisfied, and Very Poorly Satisfied. The major findings were as follows: 1) The rehabilitation services used included medical rehabilitation (26.9%), followed by social assistance (23.5%), diagnosis by a physician at home (17.3%), medical examination (12.3%), housekeeping services (6.2%), and vocational and educational rehabilitation (3.5%). 2) Of the medical services, the respondents desired physical therapy at home and free rental of rehabilitation equipment, such as wheelchairs, canes, walkers, the most, followed by home visit occupational therapy, nursing services, and oriental medicine service in descending order. 3) Some of the respondents expressed so-so satisfaction (50.0%) or dissatisfaction (16.9%) with the rehabilitation services provided by the Wonju Public Health Center. These findings should prove useful when planning or extending community-based rehabilitation programs for the homebound disabled in the community.