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Whether low-tech or high-tech, assistive technology improves functionality for people with disabilities

Featured Quote: “Assistive technology is really any device, strategy, product, or system that you can implement to make someone with a disability – or I would say even without a disability – be able to improve their functional abilities. So, anything you can implement, and sometimes it is just strategies. Sometimes we go into an office environment and someone doesn’t realize that their phone’s too far away. I walk in, and they’re talking about having shoulder pain. They have chronic cumulative trauma disorder – just from reaching, their shoulder hurts. I’m like, ‘Why is your phone over here?’ … So it could just be a strategy of putting something in a different place.”

Ashley McLeroy, rehabilitation engineer, Alabama Department of Rehabilitation Services

Assistive technology – both high- and low-tech – enables people with disabilities to live more independent lives and to participate more fully in school, work, and the community. 

In this interview, Ashley McLeroy, a rehabilitation engineer with the Alabama Department of Rehabilitation Services, chats with Alabama Care Anchor McCartney Hagar about what assistive technology is and how it is beneficial to individuals with and without disabilities. 

Show highlights:

What is assistive technology? 

Adaptive note-taking 

Ups and downs of rehab engineering 

How to find the right assistive tech 

Custom adaptive mouse demonstration 

Accepting the transition to using new devices 

Alternative computer access 

Alternative computer access demonstration 

Involving consumers in choosing assistive devices 

When a device doesn’t work for the consumer 

Low-tech, high-tech, and mid-tech assistive devices 

Rehab engineering with a disability 

Adapted toys demonstration  

Adapted toy race 

Resources mentioned in this broadcast:

ADRS Rehab Engineering and Assistive Technology Program

Want to hear more community, school, and work success stories? Visit #community to view similar posts.

To learn more about services and waivers, visit www.mh.alabama.gov or www.rehab.alabama.gov

Alabama Care is partially supported by the Alabama Council on Developmental Disabilities (http://www.acdd.org/). The views expressed are not necessarily the views of these organizations.

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