3D printing of bespoke aids (Assist3D)

Persons with disabilities, for example as a result of stroke, rheumatoid arthritis and patients with moderate, severe to profound mental disabilities often need occupational therapy aids to help them perform activities in daily living.
Currently almost all of these patients are provided with prefabricated aids. However it appears that these prefab tools often do not fit well or insufficiently. A bespoke aid can offer a solution here. The production of bespoke aids is currently a very labor-intensive and therefore expensive process. The production of devices with complex anatomical shapes even increases the price. Innovative measurement and production techniques such as 3D scanning and 3D printing are ideally suited for the manufacture of unique products with highly complex shapes.

The Assist3D project aims to introduce innovative production techniques (3D scanning, 3D design and 3D printing) in the field of occupational therapy. In this way, we want to enable the occupational therapists and orthotists to produce truly bespoke aids for daily living by using 3D scanning, 3D design and 3D printing techniques. In this way they are able to help their patients better and faster which improves the quality of life and participation of the patient.

To achieve the project goals we:

- established a digital workflow for the fitting, design and production of bespoke 3D printed devices

- performed 39 case studies in close collaboration with patients, therapists, healthcare organizations and technology companies. These 39 cases concern bespoke aids for which there is a real need within care organizations

- for each of these cases we went through the following steps: interview to get to know the needs and determine the specifications, 3D measurement (if necessary), choosing the required material properties and degree of finish, 3D designing, 3D printing, finishing (if necessary), user testing and evaluation through a validated questionnaire

- organized workshops and created guidelines and codes of good practice to ensure dissemination of the project results to education and the professional field