A confirmation regarding marketing of a new assistive device designed for the blind from United States Food and Drug Administration has initiated hope for the blind. The FDA has cleared marketing of the new device. The device works through a gentle pattern of electrical simulations on a user’s tongue translated from digital information stored in a video camera.
About 74 people were used as subjects for testing this new device. The FDA has reported in a press release that studies have stated about 69% of people, who completed the one-year training for using this device, could recognize objects successfully.
The users are assisted by the device to learn how to interpret visual images once the conversion process is over. The user will need to wear a specific pair of glasses as the video camera remains attached to these glasses.
The device has been named BrainPort V100. This device is a sight-assistive non-surgical device designed for augmenting reality. Users not to consider it as a substitute of other alternative technologies created for assisting blind individuals, for instance, guide dogs, canes, or seeing eyes.
Wicab, a company based in Wisconsin, has designed the BrainPort V100. It’s a battery-powered device that contains a flat, small, intra-oral unit boasting around 400 electrodes. Users will need to hold this unit against their tongue.
The video camera’s images will be converted into electrical signals by the device’s software; these signals are then delivered to the intra-oral unit’s electrodes. Pictures will then be formed as a user’s brain will interpret the vibrations on his or her tongue.
According to William Maisel, the chief scientist at the FDA Center for Devices & Radiological Health, “Devices like the BrainPort V100 possess the potential of helping millions of people. It’s extremely important that scientists work with the aim of improving device technology for making the lives of blind Americans more comfortable and independent.”
Despite the results of these initial studies considered satisfactory, the press release sent by the FDA states that there were some subjects who reported that the intra-oral device is offering a metallic, stinging or burning taste. FDA has further added that no serious adverse reactions caused by the assistive new device were reported by the subjects. This has certainly led to a new ray of hope for the blind.
