Bionic hand market review for 2016: what to buy in Russia

Actress Angel Giuffria (The Hunger Games: Mockingbird)

15% of people on the planet have impaired functions and structures of the body that interfere with physical activity and interfere with social life, and more than 50 million people a year become disabled. Direct and indirect losses due to this problem are about 6% - in 2015 it is about 4.4 trillion dollars. This is comparable to the annual losses of the world economy from the “great recession” of 2008. And this is three times the annual GDP of Russia.

High-quality and functional prostheses could significantly reduce these losses, but the available prostheses of the extremities, for the most part, writes Izvestia citing a study by the Higher School of Economics, these are "primitive low-functional products with poor design."
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Thanks to modern materials, balanced engine placement, touch force sensors and capacious batteries, prosthetic designers have been able to create bionic hands that are capable of much of the daily activities. Some models are close to the real hand - the flexible block of the wrist joint allows Michelangelo to bend in the wrist, and others to the robots from science fiction, like BeBionic, which due to the wireless control could add the function of rotation by 360 degrees. The main drawback of modern prostheses is still the price.

BeBionic (RSLSteeper)

RSLSteeper has been involved in prosthetics for over 90 years. She is known to the general public thanks to the BeBionic line of bionic hands. The launch of the first version of the prosthesis was announced in 2010 at the International Society for Prosthetics and Orthotics in Germany. The prosthesis had four functional grip. The thumb acts as a “switch” between their groups.



The second version of the hand BeBionic received an interesting design and a large number of claps. There was a special grip for a computer mouse - the developers have provided a double click. Sensors allow the hand to adapt to the shape of the object in the user's hand.



BeBionic 3 appeared already in 2012. In the video below, Nigel Ackland shows the different grip that the hand is capable of.



BeBionic Small is 30% smaller in size than BeBionic 3, and the bionic arm weighs 390 grams. At the fingertips there are pads for working with small objects. The first user of BeBionic Small was Niki Ashewell from the UK.





“When fully charged, prostheses will work during the day. In the evening before bedtime, they need to be removed and put the battery on charge, ”- told in BeBionic. This is one of the downsides - people have to remove the device when going to bed. The guarantee for such a bionic arm is one year, but it can be extended to five years.

Each finger of the hand has its own motor, located so as to balance the device itself. The microprocessor monitors the position of each finger. In total there are 14 grip for daily affairs. The user can control the speed and strength of the grip, for example, to not break an egg or break a disposable cup. There is an auto locking function in your hand - if the processor realizes that the object is now falling out of the prosthesis, it automatically strengthens the grip.

The prosthesis can be lightened by the materials: these are aluminum parts and a BeBionic carbon fiber body. At the same time, the BeBionic 3 hand holds up to 45 kilograms. Thanks to wireless data transfer, developers managed to add an interesting feature: the hand rotates 360 degrees.

Touch bionics

BeBionics, thanks to its work with the media and at various events, is now perhaps the most recognizable brand. But the RSLSteeper hand was not the first bionic hand. Back in 2007, Touch Bionics began to install the world's first hand of this type. Even then, the i-Limb myoelectric prosthesis made it possible, with the help of sensors installed in just two muscles, to work with different grip.



In 2014, a version of i-Limb Revolution. Prostheses of this type allow you to do a lot of things that for two-handed people seem completely ordinary, simple: put things in a suitcase and vitamins in a pill box, hold a food bag and open a chest drawer, collect Lego with both hands and tie shoelaces.



When we do something with our hands, we often use our wrists. Often prostheses do not give the opportunity to repeat this trick with an artificial hand. In Touch Bionics, this problem was tried to be solved with the help of a mobile wrist prosthesis, which allows moving the hand 40 degrees relative to the standard position in both directions.



In 2015, Touch Bionics introduced i-Limb Quantum, a more futuristic and at the same time more functional hand. The device received 24 preset grip and the ability to configure 12 more grip under the owner.



Owners of prosthetic devices from the i-Limb range can use the mobile application to select grips, adjust their strength and program new movements. It is important to note that this prosthesis has the most successes of all that are presented in this article. Only this bionic arm has the function of changing the grip with the help of gestures: the programmed grip is activated when the arm moves in one of the four directions.



Touch Bionics on YouTube lays out interesting videos with various things people do without and with dentures. For example - cooking with i-Digits - prosthetic palm and fingers.



Touch Bionics, founded in Scotland in 2003, had revenue of $ 15 million by 2015. Especially high were sales in Germany and France. Icelandic Ossur in 2016 bought this company for 27.5 million pounds. According to experts, this may be due to not the most successful business model, according to which the company made expensive supercomplex devices.

Ossur is a serious player in the market for lower limb bionic prostheses - a much larger market. With the help of Touch Bionics, she expanded her competence in prosthetics.

Ottobock

One of the leaders of the world market of prostheses - the German concern Ottobock . In Russia, several developments are available from this concern.

The MyoFacil line is a myoelectric device with a modest set of functions. They are intended for people with arms amputated below the elbow. In the video below, a person without both hands with such prostheses who does ordinary daily activities - he shaves, brushes his teeth, makes the bed, has breakfast with his girlfriend, strokes the clothes and drives the car.

“The prosthesis MyoFacil costs about 400-500 thousand rubles, it depends on the company that installs the prosthesis, and on consumables. This is a simple entry-level device, ”they say in the company.



The setting speed of such a hand reaches 300 mm per second. The prosthesis allows keeping small and large parts.

The downside is that there is only one grip. In fact, this is just a myoelectric "hook" with a glove.



Advanced development of the company - Michelangelo. In the video below, someone compared the Michelangelo prosthesis with i-Limb not in favor of the latter. Michelangelo has seven basic grips, allowing including to keep small and flat objects.

“The finished prosthesis costs about 2-2.5 million rubles, it depends on the configuration. After all, the period of service of the product is 3 years, and the glove on it must be changed every six months. You can purchase a kit with one glove, but this is not enough. Such consumables increase the cost. In addition, the cost is also affected by the complexity of the work - it depends on the patient's stump, ”they say in the company.



The arm is built on the Axon-Bus system, the technological basis of which was created for the aerospace and automotive industries, later adapted by Ottobock for prosthetics. Thanks to the AxonWrist swivel, the wrist can be bent and rotated.

The use of the prosthesis helps the patient to maintain correct posture, to avoid curvature of the spine in one direction. This is important both during daily activities and walking. In a relaxed state while walking, the bionic arm behaves like a natural hand — swaying. This reduces the effect of amputation on posture caused by unnatural compensating movements.



In the case of this prosthesis, the existing “bug” of the human hand with fingers remains: two motors provide movement of the thumb, index and middle fingers, while the ring and little finger move behind them. At the fingertips - soft material that allows you to work with small objects.



The prosthesis provides seven grips, including an open palm.





“As a rule, all our products with active use work for at least a day on one charge. The market for the upper limbs is certainly smaller than the market for the lower limbs. In Russia, it is probably 5-7 thousand prostheses per year. How many bioelectrics are hard to say. MyoFacil also comes under it with a minimal set of functions, ”the company’s Russian representative office said.

When asked about the state of affairs in Russia, Ottobock replied that "the market is not so strongly developed, not because of the lack of components, but because of the limited number of specialists who know how to make such products."

Bionic hand flaws

Battery
A short time working on a single battery charge is the disadvantage of most modern gadgets. Bionic hands with active use can work during the day, but this is not enough. As most people are tied to sockets by the need to recharge smartphones and laptops, so people with dentures have additional inconveniences when, for example, traveling. You can use second-third batteries.

Lack of protection against water
Another drawback - as a rule, such devices do not work in water. They can not swim, take a shower. It is important to protect them with special gloves to prevent dirt from getting inside the device. Perhaps in the future there will be bionic hands with a fully sealed case, which allows you to remove your hand very rarely - only for scheduled maintenance.

Lags when running
This is not to say that dentures are slow. Sometimes they are capable of high speed, they can be stronger than the second hand of a person who wears one bionic prosthesis. But when controlled by myoelectric sensors, users have a lag: first, the brain transmits the command to the muscle at the sensor, then the sensor transmits the command to the engine, and then the gesture changes. So the reaction is far from the highest.

This problem, but with prosthetic legs, was successfully corrected by Ossur. The prosthesis allows you to manage mentally, and the installation of the foot occurs in just 15 minutes - the surgeon only needs to install sensors in the rest of the limb. After that, a prosthesis is put on, which does not connect with muscles and nerves. Sensors receive a signal from the nervous system and transmit it to the prosthesis.

Price
Depending on the configuration, the cost of the bionic arm will be up to 2.5 million rubles. This is far from the most affordable devices.