Digital fabrication labs and maker spaces have emerged across the globe to become local community hubs for a wide range of Do It Yourself-activities. In parallel, open source information and tools have triggered grassroots solutions in healthcare. Patients, their families, carers, health professionals and designers started to create personalised ‘open’ healthcare solutions in a bottom-up way. Instead of waiting for public healthcare services to satisfy their needs a growing number of citizens takes action themselves, regardless of national healthcare policies and regulations. During the rapid spread of the novel Coronavirus (Covid-19) worldwide we are all witnesses to the importance of the maker community for a rapid response to the lack of medical hardware supplies. Maker spaces were called to use their digital fabrication tools to e.g. 3D print valves for life-saving Coronavirus treatments or face shields to offer some protective gear for doctors. But not only does the maker community contribute to the rapid production of needed pieces, it also shows its responsible innovation capacities by rapidly prototyping, testing, documenting and reproducing new products that are needed.
The careables project sees great potential for social transformative innovation in these initiatives and proposes an open and inclusive approach to healthcare based on digital fabrication, distributed manufacturing and collaborative making. Within careables we aim to link local communities of citizens with disabilities, their families, and healthcare professionals with makers/designers to establish collaboration between these separate communities to develop open-source interventions and solutions, so called “Careables”. A careable as an open solution that aims to improve the quality of life for people with unmet needs or facing physical limitations. Careables are co-designed, replicable, accessible, adjustable, and shareable online, using digital technologies. Careables is a new category that promises readily customized solutions and a horizontal and collaborative approach to health and care.
Careables are driven by a methodological commitment towards co-design of ‘open’ healthcare solutions, involving all relevant stakeholders. Key to co-design is that people become creators, not only users of innovation. In our case, patients, their families, healthcare professionals and designers are involved in the co-design process as experts in their specific environments, together with makers, who are experts in the use of digital tools, such as 3D printers, laser cutters, etc. At a global scale we offer a platform for sharing open healthcare solutions, including detailed documentation to facilitate the replication and adaptation of careables.
