Insight Statements
Hana Ellis-Kaa and her Mum
We met at school on the 5th of June
We were amazed to learn that the hardest challenge Hana faces on a daily basis is having no independence she is accompanied by her family or teacher aids all the time even when taking showers and sleeping. She feels that she doesn't face next to no discrimination. She wishes she could drive and will have epilepsy for the rest of her life. Epilepsy can be triggered by anything no matter how big or small so preventing yourself from having epilepsy becomes very very hard. For example we interviewed a 16 year old girl that had been diagnosed with leukemia. With this diagnosis came chemotherapy which caused a brain injury, (which is very rare, only one other person in New Zealand has the same brain injury). This brain injury triggered her epilepsy. She will have epilepsy for the rest of her life but she has come up with multiple coping mechanisms, she plays with a rubix cube before bed to relieve stress. She has also learnt some sign language so that she can communicate with her family after having a seizure. One thing she struggles with is independence, because she always has to have someone with her in case she has a seizure and usually has 3-4 small ones a day. After she has a seizure she is very dazed and cannot walk or speak, hence why she learnt sign language.
It would be great if we could make an app that helped her deal with stress and get to sleep sooner.
Linda Williams
We met on the 11th of June on a Zoom call.
We were amazed to learn many people don't actually know much about what epilepsy is and that when people find out that they have epilepsy they often treat them very differently. This can be because back when the drugs were first made they were very scary because they altered someones personality so much that they would have to be put in disabled classes. Linda want people t be treated like they shouldn't have to worry about "not being normal" and that they should be
Kay Richards
We met on the 9th of June
We were amazed to learn about all the science and genetics behind epilepsy. It was really interesting to learn these new things about epilepsy and how it is diagnosed and what could trigger it. There is a lot of science behind the drugs and how they can negatively and positively impact the user. Kay Richards works in genetic epilepsy and drug therapy for epilepsy. She shared some really interesting information with us that will be super helpful going forward with our project. Her research was really in depth and would be great to use for our project and our final product.
It would be great if we could use her research and her information that she shared with us to help get a better understanding of the genetics and science behind epilepsy and the medication. It would be great if this research could help us with our final product.
Steve Richardson
We met on The 15th of June
We were amazed to learn that my father has helped with Epilepsy NZ in the past and has lead the way for many others as he struggles and overcame a lot of adversity because of Epilepsy. It would be great if we could spread awareness about Epilepsy and create reminders to take his drugs and methods to help with stress.
It would be great if we could include medication reminders in our app.
Ideas
Ideas
Ideas
Our product
Above is our product design which covers all problems people with Epilepsy face daily. Our app has three different options for the different people that could use our app, one option is to help a family member deal with having a loved one with Epilepsy, one for people who want to learn about what Epilepsy is and lastly the most important option is for everyone who has Epilepsy. For the Awareness aspect we have made a online picture book, video specified for what you what to learn about and a option where you can share your story online. We also have a monitoring option to give people with Epilepsy independence, there is a option where you can monitor the pulse in order to alert when they have a high chance of having a seizure. The other aspect is helping people with Epilepsy with the mental affects with meditation and music to help them calm down to help with insomina or to relieve stress because stress can increase the chance of having a seizure.