• Journal of rehabilitation welfare engineering & assistive technology
• /
• v.10 no.3
• /
• pp.177-184
• /
• 2016

The purpose of this study was to investigate caretakers' demands and request in electric wheelchairs. The survey included the usability questionnaire (safety, operability, satisfactions) which were selected by opinions of caretakers and specialist of rehabilitation for electric wheelchairs. The survey also included questionnaires consisting of such questions as to demographic information, care experience, care time, and care burden, and demand for folding electric wheelchairs. Participants were fifty caretakers of electric wheelchair users. Caretakers' average age was 54.54years, and the average duration of their care experience was 80.98 months with average care time 9.80 hours per day. In safety and operability, most of participants were mostly satisfied. However, in satisfaction of weight and clean of electric wheelchairs was dissatisfied. They reported that the biggest problem of electric wheelchairs were too heav and difficult to control and that the greatest difficulty in helping electric wheelchair users was helping them with transfer to and from the wheelchair. They also need their prefer to develop folding electric wheelchairs. In this study, caretakers emphasized necessity of development light, easy to storage and clean electric wheelchairs. In conclusion, it is required to develop folding electric wheelchairs to reflect caretaker's opinions.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Precision Engineering Conference
• /
• 2010.11a
• /
• pp.983-984
• /
• 2010

• Journal of Digital Contents Society
• /
• v.16 no.3
• /
• pp.355-363
• /
• 2015

In this paper, we propose a system for controlling the seat of the electric wheelchair depending on the slope of the terrain in real time by using the ATmega smart control based on the board. Smart control board includes a gyro sensor, an acceleration sensor and Tilt sensor, when the electric wheelchairs pass slope of the terrain, they use three sensors to identify terrain configuration in real time. We also applied the Complementary Filter in the gyro sensor and acceleration sensor, so the electric wheelchairs know the exact terrain by solving the interference during the movement. Based on this, the noise power wheelchair due to the movement will be reduced, the seat continues reliably movement without being vibration. In this paper, providing an application on the smart phone platform for the convenience of users who are not familiar with how to use electric wheelchairs, they can easily control wheelchairs. Control platform of the smart phone is able to monitor the electric wheelchair in real-time, with regard to pressure prevention, help the slope of the seat to be arbitrarily controlled.

• The Journal of the Convergence on Culture Technology
• /
• v.9 no.2
• /
• pp.143-150
• /
• 2023

As Korea's per capita income increases, participation in various leisure activities to improve the quality of life of the disabled is encouraged. However, in order to participate in leisure activities, movement to the place where the leisure activities are performed must be preceded, so interest in means of transportation for leisure activities of the disabled is increasing. Since manual and electric wheelchairs have their respective disadvantages as means of transportation for leisure activities, interest in power assisting devices for wheelchairs combining the functions of electric wheelchairs with manual wheelchairs is increasing. In this study, the FDA approval process of wheelchair power-assistance products was investigated, and the characteristics of side-attached, front-attached, downward-attached, and rear-attached types of power assist devices for wheelchairs wheelchair in countries around the world were identified. These information will be of great use in helping the disabled and their assistants in Korea to choose the optimal product according to the patient's condition. More usability tests and clinical case studies are needed so that people with disabilities can choose a power assist device suitable for them.

• Journal of Power Electronics
• /
• v.16 no.2
• /
• pp.798-804
• /
• 2016

This paper proposes a new operation and control strategy for Power-Assisted Wheelchairs (PAW) using one brushless DC (BLDC) motor. The conventional electrical wheelchairs are too heavy and large for one person to move because they have two electric motor wheels. On the other hand, the proposed PAW system has a small volume and is easy to move due to the presence of a single wheel motor. Unlike the conventional electric wheelchairs, this structure for a PAW does not have a control joystick to reduce its weight and volume. To control the wheelchair without a joystick, a special control system and algorithm are needed for proper operation of the wheelchair. In the proposed PAW system uses only one sensor to detect the acceleration and direction of PAW's movement. By using this sensor, speed control can be achieved. With a speed control system, there are three kinds of operations that can be done on the speed of a PAW: the increment of PAW speed by summing external force, the decrement of PAW speed by subtracting external force, and emergency breaking by evaluating the time duration of external force. The validity of the proposed algorithm is verified through experimental results.

• Journal of Integrative Natural Science
• /
• v.15 no.2
• /
• pp.83-87
• /
• 2022

In this study, through a survey on traffic safety campaigns for electric wheelchairs for the disabled, we found out what is necessary to solve the inconvenience of disabled people driving electric wheelchairs and living in society. The conclusions for each role of the severely disabled are as follows. The government has enacted a law on fostering convenience facilities for the disabled in accordance with reality so that the disabled, who are vulnerable to transportation, do not have any inconvenience in their social lives. However, it is not kept in reality, so there are many obstacles to the social activities of the disabled. In addition, local governments should subscribe to electric wheelchair insurance for the disabled to minimize the damage to the disabled in the event of an electric wheelchair accident. Organizations related to the disabled provide safety wheelchair driving education to prevent electric wheelchair accidents in advance and receive complaints about inconvenience. It can be concluded that people with severe disabilities can prevent accidents in advance by installing a moving ring tone on an electric wheelchair so that they can know the movement of the surrounding wheelchair.

• Journal of the Korean Society for Precision Engineering
• /
• v.23 no.2 s.179
• /
• pp.172-180
• /
• 2006

Although there existed many types of manual/power hybrid wheelchairs, their use was not widespread because of their inconvenience in converting drive system and in folding frames. To carry a wheelchair in the car or to convert driving methods, some hard work of disassembling or exchanging wheels was required for most of currently available hybrid wheelchairs. In this study, the standard foldable manual wheelchair was reformed to a power wheelchair by installing the newly developed Axial Flux Permanent Magnet(AFPM) type of brush less direct current(BLDC) motor on each rear hub of wheelchair. This wheelchair could be driven by manual or electric power without exchanging. wheels, thus no additional work was needed for carriage or for power conversion. The developed wheelchair was evaluated for durability, stability, maneuverability, cost, and reliability in accordance with the Korean standards. The results indicated that the developed hybrid wheelchair was good enough for commercialization comparing to other imported wheelchairs.

• Journal of Digital Contents Society
• /
• v.19 no.8
• /
• pp.1507-1514
• /
• 2018

The purpose of this study was to propose a functional improvement solution of integrated control board for safe driving of Smart electric wheelchair for a single person. In the case of existing electric wheelchair products in Korea and elsewhere, safety-related functions or devices are not included in many cases. Therefore, the incidence of electric wheelchair-related accidents is continuously increasing in the current situation in which the elderly and the disabled people have been continuously increased. However, currently only high and middle-priced products are equipped with basic safety devices in electric wheelchairs, so low-priced products require safety related functions. Therefore, sensing obstacles that the user can not recognize while moving an electric wheelchair and detecting automatically the terrain change to control the motor by developing a smart control platform. This provides an integrated control board that can be applied to various electric wheelchairs for more stable driving.

• 제어로봇시스템학회:학술대회논문집
• /
• 2001.10a
• /
• pp.89.4-89
• /
• 2001

We propose an electric wheelchair that is suitable for the upper-limbs disabled with sufficient operability and low expenses. Features of this wheelchair, 1) By instating a simple mechanical module, existing electric wheelchairs can be readily converted to a special version for the upper-limbs disabled. 2) The electric wheelchair can be freely operated by motion of a head. 3) A vision system to assure safety operation by the disabled is introduced.

• Journal of Institute of Control, Robotics and Systems
• /
• v.19 no.10
• /
• pp.936-940
• /
• 2013

As the ageing population grows around the world, the demand for electric wheelchairs, an important mobility assistance device for the disabled and elderly, is gradually increasing. Therefore, a number of studies related to intelligent wheelchairs are actively underway to improve safety and comfort for wheelchair users. However, previous collision avoidance studies for intelligent wheelchairs have concentrated on collision avoidance methods with the shortest distance and by only changing either velocity or heading angle, rather than considering the forces exerted on the user. If a collision avoidance algorithm that does not consider these forces is applied to an intelligent wheelchair, there is a possibility of an accident due to falling as wheelchair users are generally disabled and elderly people. In this paper, we propose a collision avoidance algorithm which minimizes the forces exerted on a wheelchair user by minimizing the variation of the wheelchair's velocity and heading angle when the sizes, positions, velocities, and heading angles of a wheelchair and a moving obstacle are known.