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L-R: Shannon Donovan, COM '22; President James Herbert, PhD having a tour of the Makerspace
multi-disciplinary team, what we call the founders of the business. They have to think about the customer- the first part of design thinking is empathy. The founders have to really talk with the customers and understand what they need- that's part of what they call an ideation process.” He has been involved in the foot drop project, which Student Doctor Donovan aptly dubbed, Gait Project X (GPX). For each project, Esty helps student innovators look at disruptive technologies, technology that is transformative for a market by minimizing or freeing up resources for a project. In GPX, they focused on low cost systems to develop the prototype, including a $50 sensor, $25 Arduino, and free, open source software to help develop the code. “The other thing is a Raspberry Pi, a basic computer, about $35-50,” Esty explains. “This is wireless, so there's no wires to hinder you while you're walking. We're moving from Bluetooth to Wi Fi, because it's a little quicker on the data output.” The team used IBM Watson, another disruptive technology, to hook up to the cloud. Data from the shoe goes to the cloud and is then analyzed using other artificial intelligence tools.
As the team built their prototype, they not only thought about what they wanted their product to do, but its application. With any innovative design, consumer compliance needs to be evaluated. Esty explains that patient compliance with GPX is more easily mediated: “So there's a couple of things that [GPX] does support. The first is the doctors can see you're doing your exercise, so that may allow you to go home earlier, say from the hospital, because they have a way of making sure you're doing the exercise. The other thing is, since it is collecting data associated with you, you get more of a personalized care response, so they can develop your plan according to your stride and how much foot drop, and then they can make sure you're following your plan.” In order to fine-tune their minimal viable product, or what the product could look like after many iterations, the team adheres to what Esty calls an “agile process,” a project management tool that encourages frequent meetings or check-ins to foster productive progression. As the Clinical Lead on GPX, Student Doctor Donovan has implemented the process by leading her interprofessional team and keeping them on track. “You’re leading them down this clinical path, doing weekly check-ins, determining what's going to be our next step, and to see if we met that goal,” she says. “You're doing what a doctor would do, working with and leading that team. So it is good practice in that sense, learning how to delegate.” For Student Doctor Donovan, it was the first time in medical school where she had opportunity to work with other students who weren’t also in medical school. Having to explain foot drop, and its implications forced her to practice what she might say to her own patient one day. “You do have to educate to be a leader, because you want them to be on board, and they're not going to be if they don't believe in the project.”