From a Press Release

What began three years ago as the Parkinson’s Glove Project at Northern New Mexico College (NNMC) and Española Valley High School’s (EVHS) has transformed into Española GloveWorks, a newly formed 501(c)(3) focused on developing youth creativity, technical competence and leadership while bringing the hope of a promising technology to people suffering from Parkinson’s disease.

Students from the EVHS MESA (Math, Engineering, Science Achievement) program are working with mentors from Northern’s Engineering and Nursing departments and community volunteers to develop gloves to ease the symptoms of Parkinson’s.

In the first phase of the project, Northern and MESA students designed gloves that send small vibrations to the fingertips to help reduce several of the motor symptoms associated with Parkinson’s.

The students reverse engineered the gloves based on the research of the Stanford Medicine laboratory of Dr. Peter Tass. This technology has been shown to reduce symptoms without drugs or surgery, has no side effects and may allow some patients to reduce their drug intake over time.

Of the 100+ people the project has served, approximately 10 to 20% say they experienced a significant, positive impact on their quality of life, while others have reported a moderate impact.

A $25,000 Youth Civic Infrastructure Fund (YCIF) grant from the New Mexico Community Trust has launched a new phase of development, funding the creation of a capstone course for the high school students that will help them synthesize and apply skills they’re learning in class to the refinement and production of the Parkinson’s gloves.

“This grant is not putting these kids to work as solder monkeys or code monkeys,” NNMC Associate Professor Steve Cox, who initiated and continues to lead the Gloveworks project, said. “They are learning how the glove works and developing its next generation.”

The grant is funding 12 paid internships for high school students and four paid internships for Northern student mentors. EVHS teachers Janice Badongen Patal-e and Lyne Salero, who lead the MESA program and are intricately involved in this project, also receive stipends. Several community volunteers are assisting with the design and construction of the gloves and providing technical expertise, including helping students develop a new app and suggesting improvements in the functionality of the glove.

“I see a huge unmet need,” Cox said. “We’re not trying to monetize on that need. My students and I found we could effectively reproduce these gloves for $125 a pair.”

At the end of the first phase, Northern will be eligible to compete against 12 other grant recipients for a YCIF Implementation grant. Four organizations will receive an additional three years of funding at $50,000 per year to implement programmatic activities related to their project.

The project also received a boost from a private donation of $14,000 from Ken Heidkamp. Heidkamp, who has Parkinson’s, tried unsuccessfully to get into the Stanford Medical glove study. He had better success with Rice University, where students developed a glove also inspired by Tass’ research. Those gloves started to overheat as they got older, so Heidkamp continued his research and stumbled across Northern’s project.

“I was impressed by the forward thinking that Steve presented, involving the high school students, thinking of an app with a phone,” Heidkamp said. “He’s got all these fantastic ideas, and I just saw the potential there, versus just producing gloves that vibrate.”

The glove project has an expanded focus this year. In addition to solving engineering challenges to make the glove more effective and practical, the students are looking at ways to provide better care and individualized programming for those using the gloves.