Over 30 million people worldwide suffer from involuntary shaky hands, known as tremors. This symptom is commonly associated with Parkinson’s disease, but is even more prevalent for people with essential tremor.
Tremors make simple everyday tasks, such as eating and drinking difficult or impossible. Consequently, patients feel ashamed and frustrated, require help with daily activities, and ultimately experience a poor quality of life.
Current currents are often not sufficient in reducing symptoms. Generally speaking, pharmacological treatments suppress around 50% of the symptoms for half the people. Surgical intervention can provide much greater reduction, but at the costs of being very invasive, and eligible for a small patient population.
STIL developed a novel method of using mechanical joint damping to reduce action tremors. This anti-tremor orthosis is fully mechanical, and was clinically effective for essential tremor in the forearm. A subgroup of patients, nevertheless.
The goal within the EIC project is to go far beyond that. The Stabilis, the next generation anti-tremor orthosis, is aimed to serve the entire patient population and covered by health insurance, thereby truly creating a new treatment option for millions affected by tremors.