Medical innovations have saved the lives of millions of people around the world. However, in focusing on the science and technology behind life-saving devices, the aesthetics of the pieces have been left behind. In reality, these gadgets are often clunky and conspicuous, in contrast with the sleek, glossy machinery we see in countless films about a future world with innovations. To rectify this issue, Dr. Leah Heiss, an Australian RMIT University lecturer, researcher, and designer, creates human-centered wearable technologies.
Heiss’s focus on human-centric design stems from the insecurities faced by individuals with health issues and the attention-grabbing devices used to administer medication. In a 2013 Design Matters: Melbourne International Design Week showcase, Heiss asserted that the role of the designer is “to try and empathize with the final user” and to “be in their shoes when designing.” As she put it, “as a designer working in this field, I have to trade places with these people. I have to experience their joy, their pain, their humiliation, their stigma, and do something with it and something with that.”
This goal as a designer motivated Heiss to design several pieces of medical jewelry, such as the world’s first self-fit modular hearing aids known as Facett. The aid is reduced to a core, which controls the settings, and a rechargeable battery module. Instead of using disposable batteries that are hard to change, especially for consumers with arthritis or other health issues, users can magnetically click the core and battery module into place. The aids also have a rich sound with its input filtered through 96 output channels.
To gain insight on how her hearing aids were used, Heiss studied 25 users to learn what it’s like to live with a disability and rely on technology aids for work. She learned that the stigma associated with a disability is still alive and well. As a result, she sought to design a device that would immediately and consistently challenge public perception. Disabled people don’t want to be pitied or seen as outsiders. They want to be treated like the average person, and for this to occur, the stigma surrounding their disability must be broken. Heiss chose to model the hearing aids after crystalline structures because society automatically associates crystals with high value and universal desire. The design challenges preconceptions associated with hearing aids.
Aside from functionality, the Facett aid shifts the perception of hearing aids from a symbol of disability to a symbol of desirability. The aids are sleek and modeled after the facets of crystals. They come in several colors including white, rose gold, black, silver, and several more. Heiss drew influence from the mineralogy collection in the Museums Victoria located in Melbourne, Australia. The collection has minerals from nineteenth-century Europe, America, and Australia. It consists of 52,100 palm-sized specimens, including 1200 faceted gemstones, making it the largest, most diverse mineral collection in Victoria, Australia.
The gems from the collection differ vastly in appearance, which makes for a thorough study of gem structures. For instance, the Gypsum specimen M 31511, is white and has several jagged facets. In contrast, the specimen Elbaite M 46126 is deep green and has the shape of a long prism with several ridges. As a result, Leah Heiss 3-D printed around 200 models of Facet throughout the development of her pieces.
In 2007, Heiss also designed light-weight, wearable diabetic jewelry that allows users to administer insulin using nanotechnology. Heiss sympathized with the plight of these teenagers and their urge to feel normal, despite their illness.
Many teenagers are already concerned with outward appearances and looking “cool,” and having a medical illness that requires consistent treatment is not necessarily easy for them. As a result, some teenagers opt to avoid embarrassment by administering insulin in the bathroom, away from prying eyes.
Thus, Heiss began working on functional diabetic jewelry with Nanotechnology Victoria, where she immediately saw several design issues. For one thing, the jewelry could weigh several pounds. In a speech made at the Melbourne International Design Week convention, Heiss said that no one wanted to use a “giant blue rocket launcher in a metal suitcase” It had to be practical and conspicuous. A huge device that has to be wheeled around in a suitcase is off-putting to the average person, perhaps especially for teenagers.
Along with researchers at Nanotechnology Victoria, Heiss succeeded in designing an insulin distribution device able to fit in the palm of one’s hand. The necklace is an applicator for a NanoMAPS insulin patch that painlessly distributes insulin throughout the wearer’s body. The patch is a discreet 10 mm x 2 mm circular disc with several small needles attached to its surface, and it is kept in place through a simple and elegant ring. No longer does the user have to sneak off to the bathroom to administer life-saving medicine.
Through collaborations like these between designers, scientists, and researchers, individuals with illnesses can feel more comfortable and empowered. As Heiss has expressed, medical jewelry will one day redirect the agency of disclosure back to the user, allowing them to reveal its hidden functionality, or leave it as an aesthetic ornament.
