Startup Aims to Help Parkinson ’s Patients Stay Mobile

For Sidney Collin, founder & CEO of De Oro Devices, the winner of the BIOMEDevice San Jose 2019 Startup Showcase Pitch Competition, the last two years have been a whirlwind. De Oro Devices’s product NexStride, a device that provides visual and auditory cues to Parkinson’s patients to help them overcome freezing of gait, was inspired by a patient during a program at California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo, where Collin was an engineering student. “The idea that ultimately became the NexStride started as a project in the Quality of Life Plus program at Cal Poly, San Luis Obispo,” Collin told MD+DI. “A local veteran, Jack, approached the program and laid out a challenge to create a device that could help him with his freezing of gait. Over the course of several months, I developed and built the first prototype from scratch. The NexStride evolved from a sketch, to a cardboard box with crudely attached buttons and electronics, to a bulky plastic box attached to Jack’s walker.” Collin sought even more patient input. “After going to a Parkinson’s support group and seeing the number of people who could benefit from something like Jack’s prototype, I set out to do whatever it took to get this device into the hands of those it could help. That was two years ago. Since then I have brought ...
Source: MDDI - Category: Medical Devices Authors: Tags: Design Source Type: news