Figure 1.2

The problem we were faced with was the issue of creating loops with therapy bands. Therapy bands are extremely versatile and flexible bands (shown in Figure 1.2) that are used for rehabilitation, therapy, and, though less frequently, weight training [2, 4]. They can be used in a variety of exercises for both the lower and upper body due to their versatile nature. This, however, is where the issue arises. The exercises used with the therapy bands often require a knot to be tied with the ends of the band to create a continuous loop with the band. The knots are often unreliable as they can come apart with just the slightest tug or can get stuck and absolutely refuse to be untied [1]. This is especially problematic when the user of the band is unable to easily tie a knot for themselves due to a disability, a lack of experience, or not having the time to deal with the unreliability of the knots. Knots can become incredibly frustrating, as people will often need to switch between exercises that require and don’t require a loop. This issue was introduced to us by our project partners, Dr. Bennett Goldberg, who is an avid user of therapy bands, and Dr. Melody Tran, who is a physical therapist. Our goal, thus, was to create a device that can help ease the process of tying and untying a therapy band, all the while making it easily adjustable, or to remove the knot all together. More specifically, we sought to create a removable attachment to a therapy band to solve this issue that was not only quick and easy to use, but also comfortable, compact, and cheap. More information about our project partners and the development of these criteria can be found on the Users and Requirements tab.

Our solution to this problem was the device you can view in the figure above: the TheraClip. TheraClip, quite simply, is a clip that holds the looped therapy band in place. It also includes some additional features, such as a hook and protrusions, to help improve the clip’s ability to hold the band down in place, make sure that the band will not slip while in use, and increase its ease of use. To learn more about the features of TheraClip, as well as how to use the device, please visit the Concept page. TheraClip satisfies our three main design criteria: the design must make the band quick and easy to use, cheap and affordable, and compact and comfortable. TheraClip accomplishes these criteria by utilizing a “doubled” chip clip design, which was based on improving and adapting previous prototypes, and effectively satisfied all of our design criteria. This design will be made out of materials, specifically TPU and PLA, which were researched and tested to maximize its performance. To learn more about the reasoning behind TheraClip’s development, please visit the Rationale tab. Of course, with the time constraints and limited resources of our engineering process, our final outcome has several limitations in comparison to the original idea. A detailed list of these limitations can be found on the Limitations tab.

TheraClip was not developed overnight. Throughout the ten weeks of the project, we brainstormed the possible design ideas; we did in-depth research of all the relevant information, such as materials for the device, therapy band materials, manufacturing technologies and existing patents; we conducted several interactive meetings with our project partners to learn more about their expectations and concerns and to collect their feedback on our process. If you want to discover more about the development of TheraClip, the documentation of many crucial steps in our process are in the Appendices tab, including summaries of our interviews and testing, as well as a report synthesizing all of our background research. TheraClip could not have been created with our wonderful team members, who you can learn more about on the About Us! tab. Additionally, the creators of TheraClip would like to thank Dr. Alex Birdwell and Dr. Michelle Zugnoni, for their valuable guidance in the development of TheraClip, as well as Dr. Bennett Goldberg and Dr. Melody Tran for dedicating their time to this project.