Transcript
Medsort is a personalised pharmaceuticals sorting and delivery system specifically designed to support people with dementia who live by themselves to take the correct medication on time. Its developer, Madeleine, responds to a hypothetical brief of a daughter of an older man with Alzheimer’s Disease (a form of dementia) who, whilst mostly capable of living on his own, often forgets to take his medication or takes inaccurate doses. A solution to this would support both the father’s independence and health and reduce the daughter’s burden of care. Madeleine’s desktop research identified dementia as a growing concern (not least because of its concentration in older populations, and our ageing demographic), and the particular issue around remembering to take medication (given dementia’s impact on short term memory and the intersection between ageing and other health conditions which raise the likelihood of increased medication needs).
Madeline took into account other potential uses (and users) of her product, as well as the design constraints and expectations such as the need to dispense a range of pill shapes and sizes, the need to store and safely dispense medication, be safe, reliable and straightforward to use, and cost no more than $200. She evaluated a range of options for the product’s case, microcontroller, screen, input device and motor and three potential designs before determining on the final prototype, which is made primarily from plywood, MDF, Perspex, an Mg995 Positional Servo Motor and an Arduino Nano microcontroller. A ‘Real Time Clock’ enables the device to realise the programmed timings, and a pixeoelectric speaker provides the buzz to alert the user when pills are dispensed.
The structure consists of a box with a wooden base and top, and clear plastic walls. 3 holes cut into the roof allow for three vertically positioned PVC pipes (to contain the pills). Each tube is accessed through the box’s lid via a twisting cap. Approximately halfway down each tube is a rectangular hole for the servo (suspended inside the pipe by 90 degree brackets.) The servo has a small plastic attachment that is fitted to a rotary disc. This disc has a slot where a single pill can fit. As the disc rotates, when it reaches a certain angle, a slot below the disc is open, allowing the single pill to fall out onto a track which funnels the pill into a waiting cup. Mounted on the front-facing side of the box is the display and the 4x4 input keypad. Twisting differently-coloured wires connect these to the mechanism. The product name (‘Medsort’) is shown in clear white capital letters above the letterbox-shaped display. On the rear of the box is a red on/off switch.
Madeleine’s accompanying folio details the testing of the device, noting that, overall, it could be considered a success, but also highlighting how and where improvements could be made for subsequent iterations (including anti-tampering measures, increased efficiency and higher build quality).
