Communication Devices for Stroke Victims?

chowbok asks: "My grandmother recently had a stroke, which left her with the inability to speak or move the right half of her body. It also seriously impaired her motor skills on the half she can move, so she can't write. She does understand what is said to her, but she has no way to communicate. I'd like to set something up for her so that she can write notes. What I have in mind is a keyboard with rather large keys (perhaps 2" square) and a screen or monitor of some sort. I'm sure they make such stuff specifically for stroke victims, but anything labeled 'medical' will undoubtedly be astronomically expensive, even if it is a rather simple device like what I have in mind. I thought it would be easier to build one or find something similar (perhaps a toy or some such). I thought Slashdot readers might have some good suggestions along these lines. I'm not totally against doing it with a computer with a modified keyboard, but that seems like overkill when all I want is really a 'video typewriter'. Has anyone seen anything that might work for my purposes, or might serve as a good starting point?"

Comments

You want a computer; here's why.

[orthogonal]

I'm not totally against doing it with a computer with a modified keyboard, but that seems like overkill when all I want is really a 'video typewriter'.

No, you want a computer.

Why, you ask? So that you can get some sort of predictive typing interface. You'll probably also want something that allows easy one or two key selection of common words and phrases.

That way your grandmother won't have to type as much, or feel self-conscious as
P E O P L E
W A I T
F O R
H E R
to laboriously type out sentences which they've probably already guessed.

Suggestion: predictive typing based on words already typed, with a completion list mapped to a meta key and some other key, and a special meta key that pops up a list of words and phrases, each mapped to a single key:

A - "Hello"
B - "Goodbye"
C - "Visiting hours are over, you annoying cretin"

Ok, maybe not that last one.

If she's especially immoble, you might even use a two button mouse, and some Huffman encoded alphabet that includes stock words and phrases. While learning the Huffman encoding might be laborious, this could be made considerablly easier with large on screen prompts:

> Press mouse button one to select any of "A E I O U", press mouse button two for any other letter or word.
> You pressed mouse button one. Now press mouse button one again for the letters "E" or "A". Press mouse button two for "I O U" or to start over."
> You pressed mouse button two. Press mouse key one for "I". Press mouse button two for "O" or "U" or to start over.
...

Touchscreens?

[Anonymous Coward]

If you look hard enough you can find used 15" touchscreen CRTs for fairly cheap. Of course, you can buy the same things new, or with LCD displays, or as kits to add to an existing CRT or LCD. You could get one or two of touchscreens hooked up and have a virtual keyboard as large as you want. Of course this may require writing you own virtual keyboard software to get the sizes you want, and you probably should provide some sort of click or beep or other feedback, since you lose the tactile feedback by chooseing touchscreens.

That might all be too much work and is probably overkill for your situation, but it's an option you may want to consider if you haven't already.

use Perl;

[zobo]

There was an interesting presentation at last year's OSCON by someone who developed something like what you describe in Perl/Tk for a quadriplegic friend.