Haptic Glove for Braille Interpretation for People with Acquired Dual Sensory Loss (ADSL)

This paper presents a design proposal for a prototype of an electronic system capable of converting and interpreting Braille. The device is addressed to solve interpersonal communication problems regarding people suffering from acquired deafblindness or acquired dual sensory loss, more commonly known as ADSL. ADSL happens when a person partially or completely losses his/her hearing and seeing abilities throughout life, due to genetic conditions or as a secondary effect of another disease. Many technological solutions have been proposed to reduce the communication gap among people with either blindness or deafness. However, solutions regarding deaf blindness are very limited, due to heterogeneity and rarity of known cases given worldwide. Therefore, this research focuses on designing a low-cost haptic glove prototype, based on sensors, data acquisition and Bluetooth communication, to tighten the communication gap among people suffering from ADSL. Hence, it is able to recognize Braille characters from the English alphabet and translate them into plain text messages to a mobile device and vice versa. During operational tests, the research team encountered that the device provides portability, comfort and is user-friendly, which suggest a rapid adaptation of the user and of the people that he/she interacts with.