https://futurism.com/neoscope/paralyzed-man-exoskeleton-too-old
'A former jockey who was left paralyzed from the waist down after a horse
riding accident was able to walk again thanks to a cutting-edge piece of
robotic tech: a $100,000 ReWalk Personal exoskeleton.
When one of its small parts malfunctioned, however, the entire device stopped
working. Desperate to gain his mobility back, he reached out to the
manufacturer, Lifeward, for repairs. But it turned him away, claiming his
exoskeleton was too old,
404 media reports.
"After 371,091 steps my exoskeleton is being retired after 10 years of
unbelievable physical therapy," Michael Straight posted on Facebook earlier
this month. "The reasons why it has stopped is a pathetic excuse for a bad
company to try and make more money."
According to Straight, the issue was caused by a piece of wiring that had come
loose from the battery that powered a wristwatch used to control the
exoskeleton. This would cost peanuts for Lifeward to fix up, but it refused to
service anything more than five years old, Straight said.
"I find it very hard to believe after paying nearly $100,000 for the machine
and training that a $20 battery for the watch is the reason I can't walk
anymore?" he wrote on Facebook.
As this infuriating case shows, advanced medical devices can change the lives
of people living with severe disabilities — but the flipside is that they also
make their owners dependent on the whims of the devices' manufacturers, who
often operate in ruthless self-interest.
In some cases, these companies can shut down entirely, leaving a patient stuck
with proprietary tech that needs specialized software or hardware to maintain.
One man, for example, was forced to spend enormous amounts of time and effort
to teach himself how to repair a device that managed his debilitating cluster
headaches, after the company that made it went belly up. Others lost their
sight when the manufacturer of a bionic eye stopped supporting the devices.
That some of these manufacturers can come and go isn't the point, though. As
404 notes, the issue is the nefarious practices that many of them use to make
their devices difficult to fix without their help.'
Via Wilco Roos, who wrote "Wow, lots of examples of why we should force
disabled aids makers to support their crap and when they say ‘end of life’ the
need to be forced to offer all designs an manuals and tool specifications as
open source. This is hostage taking, mob like business practices. :-("
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
