There's more work to be done, but Chesca Colloredo-Mansfeld, MBA '92, anticipates a day when her organization, miraclefeet, will provide the remedy for tens of thousands of children with clubfoot throughout the developing world. At that point, she says, "I will be able to get hit by a bus and go down feeling really good."
The remedy, devised in the innovation hot spring of Stanford's d.school, is a plastic brace that's dramatically more affordable and child-friendly than the standard metal version. Its ultimate impact portends more than a medical solution: Fixing clubfoot may avert a life shaped by social rejection and long-term poverty.
There's quite a feeling that comes from making such a difference. Jeff Yang, MS '11, was one of a four-member team of graduate students who designed the brace, and he says the process upended all his career thinking. What he now wants most, after finishing his Stanford PhD in materials science and engineering, are more opportunities as personal and motivational as the clubfoot project.
The breakthrough was in some ways remarkably straightforward. The development of the brace probably didn't have an "aha!" moment as singular as its prelude—Colloredo-Mansfeld's idea to ask the d.school for help.
Clubfoot is a congenital birth defect that results in one or both feet turning inward. If it's untreated, the ability to walk is severely impaired. Worldwide, there are an estimated 200,000 new cases each year. As executive director for miraclefeet, a nonprofit based in North Carolina, Colloredo-Mansfeld has focused on the potential of a relatively simple treatment (the Ponseti Method) that includes only minor surgery. There's an easily implemented procedure for correcting the position and flexibility of the feet, followed by a three- to five-year period of wearing a brace at night and during naps, almost always ensuring a permanent cure.
But it's an imperfect fix because the braces are less than ideal—expensive, or crudely fashioned as handiwork, or too physically restrictive, or awkward to put on, or all that and worse as children pitch fits. And that means many children either don't get braces or don't wear them faithfully enough. Enter the d.school students, after Colloredo-Mansfeld hit a wall trying to prototype something better.
Yang, Ian Connolly, '11, MS '13, Michael Ahdoot, MD '12, and Katie Jaxheimer, MA '12, MBA '12, represented the kind of interdisciplinary group that's emblematic of the Design for Extreme Affordability class. Always guiding their effort to create a superior brace, says Connolly, was the d.school's mantra of human-centered design: thorough analysis of the social realities that affect how a solution is deployed, plus close interaction and prototyping with prospective users.
PUT TO THE TEST: Demos took place recently in Nicaragua (Photo: Lauren Wall).The upshot, after extensive consultations and field testing, is a quality-consistent, mass-production brace priced at $20 instead of hundreds. Shoes attach and detach for ease of use, and when the brace is worn during waking hours, its nonslip construction and comfort allow a child considerable mobility. (See the video at miraclefeet.org.)
Yang and Connolly are continuing to help with the production plans, and miraclefeet has plenty of fundraising to do: The cost per child of its international distribution programs, which supply the braces free of charge, is $250. The hope is to reach 11 countries with 15,000 braces by the end of the year.
Ahdoot, now a urology resident at the University of Miami, took a year off med school for the clubfoot project when he realized the scope of the lasting contribution he could help make. It continues to evoke emotion. "Wow," he says, "think of the number of people that could be impacted."
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