Chair for pupils with cerebral palsy in Uganda

Abstract: An adjustable chair was developed for children with cerebral palsy in Uganda. The chairs these children use today are custom made which means that they cannot be used when a child outgrows a chair. Sometimes the chair is used by other children and does not give the support that the child needs. The project was executed in the capitol, Kampala, by the two design engineer students Faith Auma and Emma Lingehed in collaboration with Makerere University, Kampala school for the physically handicapped and Katalemwa Cheshire home. The goal of the project was to help pupils with cerebral palsy from a young age develop adequate sitting behaviour and become more physically independent. The chair should be able to be manufactured and assembled in Uganda and the material should be able to be found in the country. The project started by clarifying the problem, information was collected through literature studies, study visits and interviews. The gathered information was used to create a product specification focusing on safety, environment, manufacturing and ergonomics. All background information was used throughout the idea generation. A number of ideas were generated and evaluated until a final concept was found. The final concept, called Billy, was chosen through a concept scoring where it was evaluated against three other concepts. Billy was considered the easiest concept to manufacture in Uganda and had the simplest construction. Billy was developed further and became the final concept Entebbe. Entebbe is a chair that is adjustable and gives the support a child with cerebral palsy needs. A prototype was made at Katalemwa Cheshire home.  Entebbe can be manufactured in Uganda and since it is module-based it can easily be repaired and resized by simply changing the concerned parts. This also means that parts can be reused to build other chairs. Entebbe can be adjusted in five different ways and requires no tools to assemble.