Title: Design Principles for Comfortability and Pleasant Behavioural Interactions Between People with Disabilities and Medical Assistive Products
Supervisor team: Dr Carmela Cucuzzella, Dr Brandiff Caron, and Dr Tsz-Ho Kwok
INDI Program, 2020
Mohsen is a PhD student enrolled in the Individualized program at Concordia University. He completed the BA in Visual communication and MA in Industrial Design by the specification of Medical Design at the University of Tehran. His master’s degree focused on, designing an assistive product for patients with drop foot (a disorder in walking) and focused on improving the aesthetic appeal of the brace to make it more pleasant to use.
He seeks to apply design principles in his work experience while designing medical assistive products. Making a connection between academic knowledge and practical work enabled him to recognize that assistive product design is beyond the physical form and appearance of the product. In other words, what he found in the knowledge of design is the lack of social and cultural considerations for disabled people. He also tries to involve other factors, such as patient culture and social features, which may affect patients behaviour and emotions.
These factors can help users feel more comfortable using assistive products without facing negative social prejudice. Specifically, he seeks to better understand potential unintended wrong behaviours (e.g., resisting using a wheelchair) in the use of orthopaedic products and employ an inclusive design approach to correct them.
Mohsen expects to affect patients behaviour, interactions and outlook toward the orthopaedic products in a positive way and prevent some of the unintended wrong behaviours to arrive comfortability of usage. In addition, his research included the knowledge of behaviours, design and culture as a theoretical framework to conduct his research. In this regard, first, he explores the patients’ emotional reactions toward orthopaedic gadgets. And finally, this research will achieve a set of design principles to reframe the meaning of orthopaedic products.