KT Welfare Environment Research Institute, LLC
Kiyomi Matsuo

When I was 21 years old, I got in a traffic accident on the way to my last tennis camp in college. The traffic accident left me with a compression fracture of the 9th thoracic segment of the spinal cord, which in turn, caused my lower body to become completely paralyzed, and I ended up living in a wheelchair. I have been carrying out my life and work by maneuvering my wheelchair with my arms and using the power of my upper limbs to move from my wheelchair to the bed, toilet, bathroom, and the driver's seat of my car. However, when I was 40 years old, I got tendonitis in my elbows and wrists during wheelchair tennis practice and games. As a result, I could not transfer myself to the bed for a while and, needless to say, had a real tough time of things until they got better. Also, when I was in my 50s and had a shoulder injury due to a fall, not only the transfer to the bed, but also the transfer to the car and driving became difficult, and I continued my daily life and work with the help of my wife and friends. However, the stress of not being able to do what I was able to do before was as great a burden to me as when I became a person with a spinal cord injury. What I thought about at that time was my future life as I grew older. As we get older, the strength of our upper limbs weakens, and there will come a time when we cannot transfer or move by ourselves. I was really concerned about this.

At work, I have summarized the development and usage of lifts, transfer boards, sliding seats, etc. Now that I am 68 years old, my muscle strength has weakened, so I decided to do daily exercises ( drive an Arm-Cranking Ergometer for an hour) and strength training. In addition, I use a sliding sheet lying under the heel when transferring to the bed in front to reduce resistance during transfer. Also, when transferring from the driver's seat of my car to a wheelchair, I use a transfer board to move safely. For transferring to the toilet or bathtub, I had handrails installed to assist the power of my upper limbs.

However, considering future events, I am worried about muscle weakness and the inability to do anything by myself. People may think that it would be easy for me to ask for help, but I know how hard it is to ask someone to do something that I was able to do myself in the past. Therefore, I keep thinking there is a way to do things without help. At that time, Mr. Morishima, President of Moritoh, introduced me to "Buranpo".

While in the sitting position on the bed, one transfers him/herself to the seat portion of Buranpo (left side of picture), and putting on the harnesses, one can stand up on the floor and return to the bed by manipulating the controls independently as shown in the center photo. If Buranpo is installed in the restroom, one can transfer to the toilet by oneself. I was convinced that I would be able to live independently while using Buranpo. In the future, I would like many people to try this device and demonstrate its effectiveness and recommend it to those who want to become independent and those who are seeking to reduce the burden of long-term care. I'm looking forward to its commercialization!