EPITECT - Redesigning the Epilepsy Helmet

52,000 People in the UK suffer from Intractable epilepsy that induces tonic seizures. During a tonic seizure, there is an increase in the tonality of the body's muscles  which causes the sufferer to fall over backwards.  During this fall it is common for a sufferer to bang their head oftern resulting in lacerations to the scalp and in some cases can cause brain damage which requires surgery.  The traditional way to protect the head from such injurys is the Epilepsy Helmet shown opposite.  Unsurpirsingly, most people tend not to adopt this form of protection due to it's harsh, brutal image and the stigma attatched to such a device and thus there is a high incidence of head injuries requiring hospital attention among those with such a form of epilepsy.

Traditional Epilepsy Helmet

Interviews with carers, those with epilepsy and epilepsy nurses indicated 3 key factors that should be considered in a redesign:        -  Comfort        -  Stigma        -  Effectivness These being the key areas where the traditional epilepsy helmet failed the user. This conjured up an 'Ideal' solution of an invisable, self materialising pillow to cushion the head.  Developing this Ideal, several concepts were generated adopting a self inflating head protection system utilising the available 'airbag' technology. These concepts were then modeled using basic techniques (opposite)  and taken to nurses and potential users for expert 3rd party evaluation.

Neck BraseConcept

Hood Concept

In order to calculate the pressure required within the hood to fully protect the head on impact, Finite Element Analyisis was carried out on a single pannel of the hood where an impact at optimal speed was simulated.  The tube displacement gave the information on the required pressure whilst the resultant von mises stress analysis allowe the optimal material to be selected for the hood in order to ensure the inegrity of the design.  A sample von mises analysis is shown opposite

Von Mises Anlaysis of Hood Pannel

Each of the required componenets of the system were identified, mocked up in foam and thier layout on the body explored in order to deduce the most comfortable location for each.  Initial experiments saw the layout mimicking that of a hairdresser's 'Hair Snare' (above) and so for further investigation this was used as a base unit.  In securing th components to the body, inspiration was taken from rugby body armour which discretely and securely houses body padding in similar positions to those identified by layout experiments.  From this concept a pattern was made and a prototype body unit manufactured in appropriate material for testing of comfort and fit (also above).  A prototype hood was then consructed and attatched to the prototype body unit to form the final concept

The image opposite illustrates how discretely the unit is concealed beneith clothing and as the hood is only deployed on detection of a fall, minimal stigma is suffered by the wearer.  The hood inflates in less than 0.3sec to protects all the vulnerable area of the head.  Through innovative applications of available technology a successful product was acheived which has the potential to improve the quality of life of many people with epilepsy but also to save the Health Service millions in treatment of unnecessary head injuries

EPITECT - Discrete, Comfortable, Effective

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