In the United States, around 10,000 children are born each year with cerebral palsy (CP), and 30% will go
on to have limited or no walking ability. For children with severe disabilities, independent mobility is often
impossible without the aid of a powered wheelchair. Unfortunately, the skills needed to operate a
powered wheelchair can be difficult to master and the current approach to training is both time and labor
intensive. Consequently, many children are excluded from powered wheelchair training and are thus
prevented from achieving independent mobility. To address this need, we developed the KWIC Trainer
that allowed therapists to provide powered wheelchair training using a child’s own manual wheelchair
and included a videogame-based training mode. Despite its initial success, clinicians noted two key
limitations: 1) it only included a single access method, and 2) it lacked certain usability features (e.g. quick
setup time, maneuverability, training parameter selection, etc.) that would be required for successful
integration into clinical practice. Therapists also noted that the videogaming mode needed to be
expanded to accommodate children at the earlier stages of learning power mobility. Thus, we propose in
this Direct-to-Phase II SBIR to complete development of an improved, commercially viable powered
wheelchair trainer that builds on our previous success with the KWIC Trainer. To accomplish this goal, we
have partnered with the Center for Discovery, who has developed an innovative power mobility device,
called indieGoTM, that temporarily converts a manual wheelchair into a powered wheelchair with almost
no setup time. We will expand and refine the indieGoTM system to incorporate an improved version of the
videogame-based training system developed for the KWIC Trainer, thus creating an effective new
wheelchair training system that we call the IndieTrainer. Our specific aims for this Phase II project are to:
Aim 1) Modify the indieGo electronics to enable communication with the videogame program and allow
additional access methods to be used (e.g. specially designed joystick handles, switches, or head arrays);
Aim 2) Develop an improved videogame-based progressive wheelchair training program with adjustable
safety and training settings; Aim 3) Complete an open-label, single-arm clinical trial of the IndieTrainer in
individuals with CP (n = 25). Our hypothesis is that the IndieTrainer system will facilitate more accessible
and effective power mobility training, allowing more children to improve their functional mobility and
increase their independence. At the end of this project, we will have completed initial development and
efficacy testing of a novel powered wheelchair training system. If successful, the IndieTrainer will be the
first clinical system to provide safe, gamified, and highly accessible powered wheelchair skills training in a
child’s own manual wheelchair, finally allowing children with more severe disabilities to receive effective
mobility training and increase their independence.
