The F.O.B.C group-developed project on a smart jacket for children with autism has won the first prize at the Da Nang Technology Startup Competition for Students in 2022. Members of the F.O.B.C group are students from the city’s University of Science and Technology and the University of Economics.

Smart jacket helps calm autistic children with agitated behavior down

Nguyen Manh Dung, leader of the F.O.B.C group, said through surveys conducted at teaching and care centres for children with autism, when in a state of agitation, most autistic children might behave aggressively or hurt themselves and people around them. Also, the frequency of the agitation of autistic children is about 4 times/week. If the weather is hot, the level of agitation may be raised.

According to Nguyen Hoang Bao Tram, a member of the project, teachers, parents or caregivers calm autistic children with agitated behavior down by giving them a hug and a pat. However, many children still cause injuries to the opposite person, it is only at the level of skin abrasion, but there are also many dangerous situations, Tram commented.

From here, the F.O.B.C group came up with the idea of creating a jacket as a tool to support teachers and parents in helping autistic children calm their own strong emotions.

As shared by Dung, the smart jacket without sleeves at first glance looks like an ordinary jacket, using fabric material, weighing about 1kg. It is designed to fit children aged 6-14. There is an airbag system inside the jacket, and a massage device is placed above the jacket shoulders. The smart jacket will work according to the mechanism of deep pressing stimulation.

Accordingly, when autistic children are agitated, the jacket will automatically inflate the airbag that hugs the wearer's body and the massage device on the shoulders works at the same time, helping the child quickly stabilise their psychology to return to a normal state.

Dung noted the most difficult thing as implementing this project is to find a support tool that could be used by many children with different levels of autism. In terms of technical aspect, the team took a long time to choose suitable airbags to ensure the safety of children when the device is in operation.

The jacket works by automatic mechanism and is controlled by RF waves, giving children a sense of comfort with massage. Meanwhile, some other products make them uncomfortable, sometimes even making them more agitated, added Tram.

According to the F.O.B.C team, the colours and exterior decoration of the jacket will be redesigned to create interest for children. In addition, the product will be designed with a sensor feature, which can measure and analyze heart rate and some other parameters to be able to both monitor the health of the child and be able to operate as soon as the child begins to suffer from strong emotions.

Moreover, the team plans to design a long jacket so that the air bags can be arranged to cover the entire body of the child, thus shortening the child's agitation time.

Due to the impact of COVID-19, the group has only tested the performance of its product on 10 children. The test results show that, after putting on the smart jacket for more than 10 minutes, the children gradually stopped being agitated, screaming and disturbing.

Reporting by HA TRAN - Translating by M.DUNG