Iraq Veteran Shares His Bionic Hand Experience

 Bionics

A feature story at Yahoo News profiles the struggles of an Iraq war veteran.  Fortunately for ex-Marine Kyle, a new bionic hand has given him back a lot of the freedom he lost with his hand.

AEver since he was in diapers, Kyle's dream job was being a Marine. But after serving abroad and loosing a hand in combat, Kyle's who's looking for a new direction in life - and one that will benefit his growing family.

Kyle's early experiences with prosthetics was typical.  The uncomfortable, impractical and - frankly - scary-looking hooks and claws were used briefly and set aside.  However with a new baby on the way, Kyle decided to give prosthetics one more try.

After testing out a state of the art prosthetic hand at the Hanger Clinic in New York, Kyle found a new experience and regained a lot of his lost independence.

Kyle was fitted with an Advanced Arm Dynamics Bebionic v2 hand. The Bebionic v2 is a multi-articulating myoelectric hand with upgraded individual motors for each digit that result in increased operating speeds. New grip patterns include a precision grip, mouse grip, trigger grip and improved tripod grip. The thumb can be manually positioned into either an opposed or non-opposed position. The opposed position controls tripod and power grip, while the non-opposed position controls key grip and finger point.

A total of 14 functional hand positions are available, 10 of which are factory set and four more that are selectable through the hand's bebalance software. On-board microprocessors continuously monitor the positions of the fingers to ensure accurate grip sequences. Bebalance software lets the prosthetist wirelessly program and monitor the hand. The hand also has a selectable auto-grip feature that senses when a gripped item is slipping, automatically tightening the grip for a secure and safe hold.

The fingers of the Bebionic v2 are durable and move together naturally as the fingers close, resulting in finger adduction grip. This allows the user to securely grip thin objects (toothbrush, piece of paper, cutlery) between the fingers, giving them function in a different plane.

Judging by Kyle's comments and the extraordinary video footage of the Bebonic v2 in action, the era when being an amputee is a major handicap is fading into the sunset.  How long will it be before technology like this begins to dramatically exceed human limits too?

SOURCE  Yahoo News

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