King's College London

Former paralympic swimmer and triathlete David Hill joined a team from the Department of Engineering this week as they worked together to build the next generation of prosthetic limbs.

The afternoon was one of firsts, including the first time David, who was born without the lower part of his left arm, could open a chocolate wrapper without the use of his teeth and interlock his fingers on both hands to stretch above his head.

Led by Dr Nicola Bailey, post-graduates Nicos Hadjigeorgiou and Ryan Irving used cutting-edge software to scan David’s residual limb on a smartphone, using personalised data to design a comfortable socket for future prosthetic limbs.

Sockets are designed to connect prosthetics to limbs, but their design is often one-size-fits-all meaning that they can be too loose or tight, pulling at skin and cutting off blood circulation particularly during exercise. By scanning an individual’s limb and designing a socket to match that, individuals can use their prosthetics more comfortably.

David then went on to test two types of prototype prosthetic arm currently in development, including a hybrid device that uses an individual’s body power and a small, embedded motor to increase grasp strength and comfort over existing prosthetics.

Speaking about his experience using prosthetic limbs from a young age, Hill said “I was given my first prosthetic from the age of two, which was very much a dummy. From then I’ve always been very demanding with my prosthetics, whether that’s at work, in the gym, rowing or the construction industry and I’m really passionate about making sure the next generation can go out there and do all of these things without a barrier.”

On his collaboration with Nicky and the team he said, “It’s been fascinating working with these guys and appreciating the complexity of tasks other people in my position without a paralympic mindset might struggle with and breaking down the ways to help those people comfortably complete the everyday tasks that empower them to live independently. If I had this thirty years ago, I wouldn’t have so much wear and tear on my good limb.”

Ryan Irving, Research Assistant in the Department of Engineering, said on working with Hill, “David’s insight has been invaluable for our design process. Without working with people that actually use these devices, what you design will inevitably fail to meet their needs, cause discomfort and get in the way of them achieving their goals. His ideas of how to destigmatise prosthetics have also been helpful in helping us reframe our work too.”

In the future, the team hope to work with David to design a custom socket to help with rowing training.