Joint protection Project- Ebheni H.

During the past couple of weeks our group has made progress to the point where we thought in the past we would have fallen apart. I am proud of myself and my group because we have been very open-minded and we have also seen our failures and laughed at them but, also learned from them without getting upset and giving up. Recently we have decided on a design that has seemed to make sense thus far and is coming together very well, there have been multiple bumps in the road while we have been trying to figure out this whole sewing thing which has given us all the reason to say that there is no way in a thousand years that we will ever become seamstress’. For example we had no idea at the beginning what seam allowance was and we had to figure out the hard way by making a glove that in no way fit any over our finger and it was supposed to be for our whole hand, well mine. 

Right now our design consist of four different parts, there is a protection device that will protect the fingers from jamming by inserting rubber cuffs on the tips of the finger, following that there will be devices that support the movement of finger but also prevent them from smashing and dislocation. There will also be a part that is two different pieces but serve the same purpose, which is “glove” type device that all the other components will go on top of the “glove” which is made of a jersey mesh.

Lily did research and her research led her to other products that specifically finger damage. The one that stood out to her was the one that prevented mallet finger, and she learned more about mallet finger at American Academy of Orthopedic Surgeons website. The small pop up visual is a good reference to the damage that occurs on the to the thin tendon that straightens the end joint of a finger or thumb, and it can happen to anyone whose finger is forced to bend further than it is intended to go after striking another object. This was helpful to our team because it appears that this type of injury can occur to a roller derby player, meaning this is giving us more information and another reference product.

At the end of this project I can see our final product being something that I see when i walk through the store because I can see our product being successful and helpful to all the roller derby women still function in their daily lives as real people and not just their roller name.