Cars have airbags, now you can too!
A BELT that instantly inflates protective airbags’ during a fall could prevent hip fractures. The belt is packed with sensors that monitor movement constantly. When a sudden fall towards the ground is detected, they activate two airbags – one covering each hip joint.
Within a fraction of a second, the bags inflate, acting as a cushion that reduces the risk of a fracture if the hip bone strikes the ground.
Initial laboratory tests on a handful of volunteers suggest the airbags reduce the force of impact on hips during a fall by up to 90 percent.
Called HipHope, the belt was approved as a medical device in the UK and Europe. In the UK around 65,000 people suffer a hip fracture each year. Most are frail or elderly people with some degree of osteo-porosis, the age-related condition that leaves bones brittle.
It is possible to buy protective clothing which have soft foam in the lining to cushion the hips on impact – these cost between £30 and £60 – but a review in 2014 by the Cochrane Library, a highly regarded organisation that vets evidence behind medical therapies and devices, concluded these reduced risk of fractures by about 13 per cent. Scientists behind HipHope say it is a more technologically advanced solution that’s protective as it mimics the success of airbags in cars. The HipHope belt resembles money belts worn by tourists to safeguard cash. It has a clip in front and two pouches on each side containing deflated airbags.
Sewn into the belt is an accelerometer – a tiny device that measures the speed of movement and direction – similar to those used in exercise monitors such as a FitBit.
The accelerometer checks which way the body is moving and the speed of movement. Also incorporated into the belt are several sensors that use lasers to measure how far the pelvis is from the ground. All the sensors feed data constantly to a microchip in the belt. If there’s a sudden fall towards the ground, the chip automatically sends a signal to an AA battery-sized cylinder – inflating the airbags in just 50 milliseconds, roughly half the time it takes to blink.
The chip is carefully programmed to activate the airbags when the fall covers a certain distance and at a certain speed, meaning the bags don’t inflate every time the user sits down quickly or goes down in a lift.
The microchip can also wirelessly send a message to a phone app if they fall, which then texts or calls a pre-determined number for a family member or friend who has agreed to help in an emergency.
Takir Khan, a consultant orthopaedic surgeon at the Royal National Orthopaedic Hospital in Stanmore, questioned whether it would prevent all fractures, as many people with osteo-porosis suffer a fracture first, then a fall – not the other way round. “If they have a weak thigh bone they may suffer a fracture while walking and that’s why they fall. The belt may prevent further damage but not the initial fracture.” – Daily Mail