Innovation Award for Entrepreneur from Chiswick

Katie Michaels developed app to help parents manage children's physio

Katie Michaels shows off her awards
Katie Michaels shows off her awards

February 22, 2023

An entrepreneur from Chiswick has received an award for a product she is developing which helps parents manage their child’s physiotherapy.

Katie Michaels was inspired to create an app after working with children with disabilities when she was a student and when a family member was diagnosed with a condition which will mean they will need regular physio.

Physiotherapy is critical for many disabled children and often forms part of their daily routine. This can be done at clinics and hospitals, but this can be time-consuming and costly for parents.

Moti Me, an app which has been developed by Katie Michaels, allows parents to practise physio with their child outside of structured sessions. Many find this challenging without support and struggle to manage their child's therapy goals. Children may become distracted during physio practice, and there is limited availability of resources to help children with disabilities practice physio.

Moti Me aims to improve communication between parents and physiotherapists, by supporting parents with the app's ability to track a child’s progress. If parents are able to support their child and increase physiotherapy practice at home, this will result in more rapid progression amongst children and therefore improve outcomes for the child.

The product has been designed considering the needs of children with disabilities - such as reduced dexterity - to ensure that the product adapts to a wide range of children. It is also intended to be fun and friendly so that the child doesn’t see physiotherapy as a chore.

Katie Michaels graduated from Loughborough University's BA Industrial Design and Technology programme in 2020. Throughout university, she spent many hours volunteering at Ashmount School where she looked after many young children with severe disabilities.

In 2021 Katie experienced first-hand the challenges many families with a special needs child face, after her young cousin was diagnosed with cerebral palsy. Shortly after this, Katie launched Moti Me and started designing a product that would improve fine motor skills, balance and muscle strength for children with disabilities.

Currently, Moti Me's prototypes are being tested with numerous physiotherapy centres, disability schools and charities around the country including STEPS Conductive Education, Ashmount School, The Movement Centre and Physio Goals 4 Kids.

After much positive feedback about the product, Katie was nominated as a finalist in the Leicestershire Live Innovations Awards. These are held annually in the Midlands and they celebrate the very best technology, services, digital advances and creative thinking that the region has to offer. This year it was held in the Leicester Space Centre and some sponsors included Rolls Royce, Morningside Pharmaceuticals, Loughborough University, Intelligent Energy and University of Leicester.

If you have a child with additional needs or work with children with additional needs, she would love to hear from you. She currently looking to trial the product so if you are interested contact her via yjr Moti Me Trial form. http://www.motimefamily.com/physio-product-trial-sign-up

 

Like Reading Articles Like This? Help Us Produce More

This site remains committed to providing local community news and public interest journalism.

Articles such as the one above are integral to what we do. We aim to feature as much as possible on local societies, charities based in the area, fundraising efforts by residents, community-based initiatives and even helping people find missing pets.

We’ve always done that and won’t be changing, in fact we’d like to do more.

However, the readership that these stories generates is often below that needed to cover the cost of producing them. Our financial resources are limited and the local media environment is intensely competitive so there is a constraint on what we can do.

We are therefore asking our readers to consider offering financial support to these efforts. Any money given will help support community and public interest news and the expansion of our coverage in this area.

A suggested monthly payment is £8 but we would be grateful for any amount for instance if you think this site offers the equivalent value of a subscription to a daily printed newspaper you may wish to consider £20 per month. If neither of these amounts is suitable for you then contact info@neighbournet.com and we can set up an alternative. All payments are made through a secure web site.

One-off donations are also appreciated. Choose The Amount You Wish To Contribute.

If you do support us in this way we’d be interested to hear what kind of articles you would like to see more of on the site – send your suggestions to the editor.

For businesses we offer the chance to be a corporate sponsor of community content on the site. For £30 plus VAT per month you will be the designated sponsor of at least one article a month with your logo appearing if supplied. If there is a specific community group or initiative you’d like to support we can make sure your sponsorship is featured on related content for a one off payment of £50 plus VAT. All payments are made through a secure web site.