Statistics state that 1 in 1500 children are born missing fingers or hands.
Because children grow so quickly, there are few prosthetic devices available to them and those that are available - can cost thousands of dollars.
Many families around the world can not afford to pay to get their child a commercially made prosthetic device they will outgrow in 4-6 months - but now, thanks to 3D printing and e-nable, a global online community of volunteers who have donated their time, talent and resources to producing open source low cost prosthetic hands - children as young as 3 years old are able to obtain prosthetic devices.
While e-NABLE has over 1600 volunteers from around the world who are designing and fabricating free hands for those in need - they are also striving to help empower families to work together to create these devices as well as encouraging the children themselves to help assemble their own prosthetic hands.
One of the goals and hopes of the e-NABLE community – is that we not only provide hands for people in need – but that we really enable these families to learn to maintain their donated devices and to build them themselves.
Working as a family to create a helper hand and knowing that they are assisting someone they love to do things many of us take for granted - is a deeply moving experience. It also encourages them to reach out and share their new knowledge with other families of children with upper limb differences and gets these children excited to learn more about 3D Printing technologies, science and engineering.
The more people we teach, the more hands can be created.
Recently, one of our designers, Ivan Owen, a 3D Printing project manager at University of WA Bothell and one of the original creators of the first 3D printed hand designs - met up with 3 Pacific northwest families to teach them how to assemble their own e-NABLE hands.
Recently, one of our designers, Ivan Owen - a 3D printing Project Manager at the University of WA Bothell and one of the original creators of the first 3D printed hand designs, met up with 3 Pacific Northwest families to teach them to assemble their own e-NABLE hand devices.
For more information - please visit www.enablingthefuture.org
