adminRobin Muchetu Senior Reporter
PEOPLE with disabilities have all the reason to smile following a local innovation to customise wheelchairs to suit the condition of the disabled person, unlike having one wheelchair for people with varying conditions. Bulawayo-based Local Rehabilitation Workshop (Lorewo) has begun manufacturing customised mobility devices to address long-standing challenges in the provision of these devices to people with disabilities.
Miss Tendai Hlabangana, an occupation therapist at Lorewo, said their core business was to manufacture mobility devices such as wheel chairs, commodes, bath stools and crutches.
Lorewo was set up in 1999 by the United Nations Development Programme but was then handed to the National Council for People with Disabilities, which is funded by Norwegian donors.
Lorewo intends to create equal opportunities for people with disability, with eight of the organisation’s 10 employees with a form of a disability.
“We are the only company in Bulawayo that is currently manufacturing customised assistive mobility devices. These are specifically designed for use according to the specific needs that suit one’s disability,” Miss Hlabangana said.
She said some of the wheelchairs offer postural support and were also designed to suit the environment that the user is in.
She said there was a need for a person to have maximum mobility despite their disability, hence a mobility device that is custom made was ideal as the individual would participate in various activities and not be confined.
Lorewo also does assembling of mobility devices together with various foreign-based organisations. They bring in parts for wheelchairs and the organisations customise them locally.
Of particular interest at Lorewo is the commode, a toilet feature that is fitted on to a wheel chair.
According to the administrator at Lorewo, Mrs Ivy Sande, the commode works well for the rural areas.
“We manufactured and fitted 88 commodes for schools in rural Plumtree through Oxfam who had contracted us to make them. They are a good product for children in a school set up where there are Blair toilets,” she said.
The commode is a toilet like feature that is fitted beneath a wheelchair; it is then mounted on top of the opening of a Blair toilet so that people who are not able to squat can just sit and use the toilet.
Another type of commode is one that is mobile where the person is wheeled to a private place and they can relieve themselves then the waste is emptied.
“The commode is good in that there is a lot of support for the person, grab rails that are sometimes found in toilets are not very effective for people who have serious support problems so a commode comes in handy,” she said.
Some school children in Plumtree were said to have been missing school as they could not use the Blair toilets and the advent of the commodes had seen many children going back to school.
The manufacture of these products was being affected by the fact that they use raw materials that are imported from South Africa so the cost of some of the products is very high.
Challenges that they face include transport, as they cannot travel to follow up clients.
“We need to visit clients to assess the condition of the patient so that we design a wheelchair that is suitable for them. We have trouble doing that as we have no vehicles. We also are not able to do follow-ups on patients who have been assisted,” said Mrs Sande.
“A wrong wheelchair can actually cause secondary disability as it will not be adapted to the type of disability a person has. So it is essential that one gets a wheelchair that suits them unlike getting the ordinary one that may cause problems.”
She said people with relatives with various disabilities had a tendency of just buying wheelchairs without getting a prescription on the specifics that can make the life of the person much better.
She, however, encouraged parents to buy mobility devices that are customised so that their children who have disabilities are able to attend school and do various activities unlike grounding them at home.
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