Son's autism leads to innovation
23rd April 2010
The father of a child with severe autism has developed technology to help him communicate.
Stephen Lodge said the idea for his Speaks4Me system came to him years ago but has been waiting for technology to catch up in order to make it a reality.
His eleven-year-old son, Callum, is non-verbal and uses his father's invention to speak.
Speaks4Me was on show at Naidex 2010 - the annual disability exhibition at the NEC in Birmingham.
Mr Lodge's system runs on any device that can run the Windows XP, Vista and Windows 7 operating system. It uses the concept of dragging and dropping images from one area of the screen to another to form sentences. The user then presses a speech button to "verbalise" the sentence.
Mr Lodge - who lives in South Yorkshire - has 20 years' experience in technology and developed Speaks4Me after deciding that other products on the market were unsatisfactory for Callum.
Speaks4Me is currently sold on a portable, touch screen media player imported from the Far East. But the company is finalising a "software only" price which will mean that it can run on any Windows laptop, desktop or even an interactive plasma white board in schools.
Mr Lodge is also hoping that it will prove useful to stroke survivors - about a third of whom lose the ability to speak, either temporarily or permanently.
Speaks4Me currently retails for about £2,000.
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