Your weekly dose of information that keeps you up to date on the latest developments in the field of technology designed to assist people with disabilities and special needs.
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This is Ricky Raley and I’m a US army veteran, and I have been an avid hand cyclist and many other adaptive sports.
Audie Kemp:
Hi, I’m Audie Kemp. I’m the owner of ATP Connect, also on the board of directors of RHI Sports Program.
Karen Lawrence:
And hi, I’m Karen Lawrence. I’m the director of the RHI Sports Program. And this is your assistive technology update.
Josh Anderson:
Hello, and welcome to your assistive technology update, a weekly dose of information that keeps you up to date on the latest developments in the field of technology designed to assist individuals with disabilities and special needs. I’m your host, Josh Anderson with the Indata project at Easterseals Crossroads in beautiful Indianapolis, Indiana. Welcome to episode 484 of assistive technology update. It’s scheduled to be released on September 4th, 2020. On today’s show, we’re super excited to have Karen Lawrence, the sports director at RHI on, and she’s going to talk about adaptive sports for veterans and individuals with disabilities, but most importantly, Karen has brought along a couple of special guests, Ricky Raley and Audie Kemp on to talk about their experiences with adaptive sports as well.
Josh Anderson:
We also have a story out of the UK talking about how ALDI is starting to use audible beeps to help with social distancing while in their stores. Don’t forget, if you should want to reach out to us, you can always reach us by email at tech@Eastersealscrossroads.org. You can call our listener line at (317) 721-7124 or hit us up on Twitter at Indata project. Now, without any further ado, let’s go ahead and get on with the show. You find yourself with a little bit more time on your hands? Maybe you’re really busy and only have a little bit of time to listen to podcasts or maybe listening to this has you thinking, well, what about this? Well, what about that? Well, if you’re short on time, or if you have questions about assistive technology, we have other podcasts that might just fit your needs.
Josh Anderson:
The first one is Accessibility Minute. This one minute long podcast gives you a little taste of assistive technology and really kind of wet your whistle to go out and find out more about a piece of technology and how it might help those you work with, yourself, or maybe a friend or family member. If you happen to have questions about assistive technology, we have assistive technology frequently asked questions or ATFAQ. This show is hosted by Brian Norton and features yours truly along with Belva Smith and Tracy Castillo, as we all talk about assistive technology with questions that come in from email, phone calls, and other means. We also don’t always know the answer so it’s very important that we have listeners that can help us out with some of those questions because while we like to think every once in a while that we may know everything, we’re proven wrong almost daily on that one.
Josh Anderson:
So if you’re looking for more podcasts to listen to, if you’re short on time and need a really quick podcast, or if you have questions about assistive technology, make sure to check out Accessibility Minute and assistive technology frequently asked questions wherever you get your podcasts. So let’s not lie. COVID-19, the coronavirus, however we want to call it, has kind of changed the world for all of us, and I’m seeing more and more stories pop up about how different retailers or different places are trying to open, trying to maintain government guidelines while still being able to serve their customers, give them a good shopping experience and maybe with the grace of God himself, turn a little profit in the process.
Josh Anderson:
So I found an interesting story out of the UK and it’s called ALDI UK Adds Audio Prompts to Traffic Light System. This is from retailtechinnovation hub.com, and I’ll put a link to this over in the show notes that talks about that all these stores in the UK have implemented a kind of a traffic light system. So basically, it’s a traffic light entry system. So you’re probably only allowed so many people in a store. Maybe they have to stay so far apart, maybe so many people in line at the checkout. I’m not a hundred percent sure. It doesn’t get into that and I am not an expert on different laws and regulations in different countries relating to the pandemic, and those would probably change by the time I became any sort of expert, but what it talks about is they do have this traffic light entry system, but they’re working with the Royal National Institute of Blind People or the RNIB, to test out adding audio prompts to these.
Josh Anderson:
So basically, so individuals who are blind or low vision or cannot visually access those lights to know when to go, when to stop, when to hang back or when to do whatever those might mean, they can have beeps and audio prompts so they can know when it is time to go and safely shop because you do want to make sure that you can still be safe, but also be able to get out and get the things you need. I mean, groceries are one of those things that we all need, and I know that some places do have delivery services or maybe some things like that, but those aren’t available everywhere. So we really got to make sure that everything’s accessible for everyone. It has a good quote in here from the strategic accessibility lead for RNIB, Mark Powell, and he comments that social distancing has turned the world upside down for people with sight loss.
Josh Anderson:
Not only has it prevented many people from being guided effectively, but many of the indicators to aid social distancing are visual in nature, making them inaccessible for people who are blind or partially sighted, and that’s very true and something we don’t really think about. If you need to stay six feet away from everyone, visually, you can kind of gauge about what six feet is and try to stay that far, but if you’re blind or visually impaired, it’s really hard to gauge that amount of space. I do really like in this story that ALDI is actually thinking about how do we serve all of our customers? So it’s kind of that universal design, that thing that can really help everyone because if you really think, if I have to sit there and watch this light the whole time to figure out when it’s for me to go, a little auditory cue wouldn’t hurt me either to be able to go, oh, it’s my turn, or oh, I need to hang back, or whatever that light is telling me to do.
Josh Anderson:
I’ll put a link to the story over in our show notes and I’ll do my best to try to keep an eye out for times when I find these stories where people are actually trying to build accessibility into some of these, well, new technologies that are coming out because of the pandemic, or I guess in order to try to keep us all a little more safe. Sports is a huge part of our culture. From a great pastime to a wonderful bonding experience, sports allows us to come together and work for a common goal. These days, I really miss sports, but today we’re super excited to have some very special guests on our show to talk about adaptive sports for veterans. Our guests today are athletes Audie Kemp and Ricky Raley, along with the sports director from Rehabilitation Hospital of Indiana, Karen Lawrence, and they’re here to tell us all about adaptive sports for veterans. Karen, Audie, Ricky, welcome to the show.
Karen Lawrence:
Thank you.
Ricky Raley:
Thank you.
Josh Anderson:
Well, I want to start off today by just learning a little bit about our guests. So I guess Audie, we’ll start with you. Can you tell us a little bit about you?
Audie Kemp:
Well, I am actually one of the first athletes that began with the RHI Sports Program back in the ’90s. I’d played a wheelchair sports since I was 15 years old. A little bit about me and my disability, I am a T12 paraplegic incomplete since the age of five. I’ve participated in the RHI Sports Program since the beginning. I was actually at the first water ski clinic on White River, if that tells you anything. I am now on the board of directors because I realized what the sports program did for me and I wanted to make sure that other people with disabilities could experience it.
Josh Anderson:
Excellent. Ricky, what about you?
Ricky Raley:
I am paralyzed from the T12 as well, but mine was from a car accident. I’m a veteran and I do have a Purple Heart from one of the explosions in Iraq so I experienced all that fun stuff and then came home. I was paralyzed and then I actually was lucky enough to go through RHI’s rehab program, which then allowed me to venture into the sports program, and before this interview here, actually, we were just talking about, I still have all of the papers that Ms. Karen gave me back in ’09, and it was a stack full of papers of links and stuff about sports and how to get the equipment and actually use that to buy my first bike.
Ricky Raley:
And once I got my first hand cycle, I felt that freedom to lose my chair and get on that bike and then ever since then, I realized what adaptive sports did for my mental health, and then Audie got me into basketball. Then he beat me up for a while, a long while. He broke my arm once so I quit playing with him, and then after just doing that, I believe in adaptive sports and the benefits of it and how it can combine that community where you need to find that community of people to talk about your disability. I learned more from adaptive sports about how to live in a wheelchair than any type of rehab ever could because I’m talking to people who’ve been there for years. That’s why I believe in RHI sports.
Josh Anderson:
Very nice, and we’ll dig a little bit more into that kind of as we go on, but Karen, do you tell us a little bit about yourself as well?
Karen Lawrence:
I’ve been a recreational therapist for 20 years working in physical rehab, and I am currently the director of the RHI Sports Program, which provides competitive and recreational opportunities for people with physical disabilities.
Josh Anderson:
Karen, just kind of sticking with you for a moment, what is the adaptive sports program there at RHI?
Karen Lawrence:
We provide opportunities for people who want to get out and participate in sports. If someone wants to participate in a competitive sport, we have opportunities there, or if they just want to participate in a recreational sport, but we do provide opportunities for people with physical disabilities. So we’re a little bit different than the Special Olympics.
Josh Anderson:
Very nice, very nice. And you guys can all kind of take this question. What are some of the sports that are available?
Karen Lawrence:
Well, just from the team’s perspective, RHI Sports has 11 different teams. So we have nine competitive teams, varsity and junior wheelchair basketball, wheelchair lacrosse, youth and adult sled hockey team, blind hockey, wheelchair and adaptive standup tennis, two power soccer teams, baseball. We have recreational teams like adult wheelchair basketball and quad rugby. We have people, if they don’t fit into an actual team, we have elite athletes like a paratriathlete, a power lifter, and a water skier, and then we have the recreational activities and that’s kind of like what Ricky just said, what’s not available.
Karen Lawrence:
There are so many different types of clinics that you can participate in one day if you just want to get the feel of something. If you’re not sure, you want to get your feet wet into a different sport and just see what it’s like, and those can be anything from water skiing, fencing, table tennis, kayaking. We have clinics going on right now for a boxing exercise program, virtual yoga, golf, an equine program and archery.
Ricky Raley:
Yeah. And as you can tell though, with that is there’s no hard lines on what… They’re not going to stay in these lanes only. So if there’s new sports emerging, they’re willing to grow and find those and bring those to people as well.
Audie Kemp:
The other thing that we see are people that come out that they’re unsure of how the sport is adapted. So it’s that resource for Indiana right now, especially that I know Karen for instance, has adaptive fishing equipment and other things so people can not only come into our clinics, but then they can take it back home and participate with their family. So it’s adaptation of all recreation as well as sports.
Josh Anderson:
I know we don’t have time today to talk about all these different adaptations and everything, but Ricky, I want to jump on something that you said just because you talked about the first kind of hand cycle that you used. Tell me how that device works. For folks who don’t know, what is a hand cycle.
Ricky Raley:
Yeah. So a hand cycle, there’s many variations for all different types of injury levels, but the ones that you’ll see, they all operate arm power and the road version are all with your arms together. So a lot of people are confused on why you don’t pedal like a normal bike individually with your hands, and that has a lot to do with just the balance issues, and then turning, you can’t do those as well if your hands are a separate like a normal bike, but the one I started on was more upright. So I sit in there. My feet go all the way up in the pair of stirrups essentially, and then which are attached to the front wheel. The bikes that we ride are pretty much a normal bicycle drive wise, upside down.
Ricky Raley:
So it is just, it looks different to a lot of people, but it’s really the exact same thing as a normal bicycle on the componentry, and then you just pedal with your arm. So you have to build up those slow twitch muscle fibers over time, and then you get to the point where you can go for hundreds of miles and just keep riding, just like anyone else, and right now, I ride with a bunch of my neighbors since, I guess, COVID happened. I ride with all my neighbors. We go out on the weekends and we ride together and it’s kind of just our time to get away and talk, and I stay with all them and it’s not a problem.
Josh Anderson:
I know there’s tons of sports available, but Audie and Ricky, can you tell me, besides of course the cycling, what are some of the sports you’ve been able to participate in and then how have they been helpful to you?
Audie Kemp:
So when I first started at the age of 15, the only adaptive sport in central Indiana was wheelchair basketball so that’s where I started and because it’s Indiana, it makes sense. So I was recruited actually at an Indiana Pacers game and you have to understand growing up with a disability, I played sports with my able bodied siblings and their friends so I got pretty good at shooting, dribbling, but not moving because folks that stand up can move a little too quick, but the funny thing is when I’m at the Pacer game, this guy comes up and goes, Hey, have you ever tried wheelchair basketball, and I said, no, but [inaudible 00:14:21] to do it, and all I thought for the week before that practice was this isn’t going to be fair.
Audie Kemp:
I’m going to be playing against a bunch of guys in wheelchairs. I’m going to kill them. So when I get out there, they run circles around me and make me look foolish, and it got my competitive spirit going. So wheelchair basketball is what started off for me. I did not break your arm. You fell over trying to shoot a layup. Don’t blame that on me. Anyway, but that wheelchair basketball then led me into the community of disabled people all over the country. The thing is I played wheelchair basketball for 25 and I have friends in every state that I know that if I ever needed them, I could call because just the history of that, but wheelchair basketball led me to wheelchair tennis, wheelchair racketball.
Audie Kemp:
I water skied on the club team for Ball State in the early ’90s because of an adaptation because they have adapted PE up there, and all that kind of led me back with RHI to wheelchair basketball, which is kind of what started the growth of water skiing and then the clinics and everything else that’s just been wonderful. So I’ve been able to try a lot of great sports, and I actually hand cycle with Ricky when I went to feel slow.
Ricky Raley:
Only your six month workout.
Audie Kemp:
That’s right. Once every six months.
Josh Anderson:
And Ricky, besides the cycling, what are some other sports you’ve been able to participate in and how have they been able to help?
Ricky Raley:
Yeah, the wheelchair basketball was a large one that other than the cycling, the wheelchair basketball brings that community, and that’s where, that and my new injury taught me a lot of daily life skills on how to transfer in and out of things and just how to function without making the world adapt to me. Wheelchair basketball made me learn how to adapt to the world, which made me now, I travel around the country. I don’t need an accessible room. I can go in and get into places and do things that I would have never learned if I stuck to, I need adaptation. Well, wheelchair basketball brought that out and said, Hey, there’s no adaptation.
Ricky Raley:
Everyone else is doing it. Why can’t you, and so then my competitive spirit says, Hey, I can do this. He’s doing it. So let’s do it, and then that led me to, I’ve done mountain biking in Colorado, which is crazy because that’s a whole different style of riding, and I was facing down and forward, going down a mountain on top of a bike, and then I’ve been skiing at different places, wheelchair lacrosse. I don’t know. There’s so many sports I’ve done. Anything out there, I’ve tried it because I need to. I just want to try it all. It’s freeing. It’s all freeing.
Josh Anderson:
Yeah, definitely. And I think you may have just answered my next question right here, just because I was going to actually ask what do you think is the importance of sports as a veteran either with or without a disability?
Ricky Raley:
Yeah. Yeah. As a veteran, you’re already a competitive personality so when you kind of get out of it, I always try to explain to people when you get out of the service and especially now when we’ve had 20 year war. So there’s a lot of combat veterans and it’s that need to find a place again, and find that community and your tribe because when you come home after getting out, you lose the people you just bonded with so closely, and now that sports world gives you those people now because you all have something in common and something that unifies you, and like Audie said, he has friends in every state because they played basketball together and they bonded over something that’s the same. So now, they have these friendships that last, and actually, you can grow yourself from those friendships as well, and that’s the importance of sports to me.
Josh Anderson:
Karen, we’ll talk a little bit more about the program. Now, is this funded by a VA grant? Is that correct?
Karen Lawrence:
We do have a VA grant that we were just awarded this year, and actually, we partnered with the YMCA and the VA to get a $240,000 grant, but this has only helped be able to get veterans to be able to participate in our program. So veterans can now participate in our program absolutely free, whether that’s a team or a clinic, but prior to that clinic, we were funded by grants, donations.
Ricky Raley:
Personal generosities.
Karen Lawrence:
There you go. So that’s pretty much how we have been funded for the last 20 plus years.
Josh Anderson:
And how has the program changed over the years?
Audie Kemp:
Over the years, we’ve added youth programs. So even though the rehab hospital in Indiana is an adult rehab hospital, we saw a need in the community where we basically created youth sports because I knew the way I grew up, that I really didn’t have any access to adaptive sports until I was 15. So now I think our youngest participant’s seven, and then the one thing the program does for veterans, injured veterans as well as anybody with a traumatic injury or someone growing up with a disability, the one thing it does is shows them what they can do before society tells them what they can’t do it.
Josh Anderson:
Nice.
Audie Kemp:
So it gives them the ability to succeed at something and get that confidence to grow on it, to try new things. So I mean, that’s the thing with the youth sports, what that has allowed us to do.
Ricky Raley:
And what I see with the youth on the sports side is when I went through school, I had sports, normal sports, able bodied sports, and I was able to go out to my team and it’s not like these kids are going to school with disabilities are disliked or even unfriended there. They have friends, but now these friends are going to these sports after school, and now these people with disabilities are not allowed to go to those sports. So by having youth programs, they have an outlet as well and so they’re not getting left behind on that social building from the teams. So I think that was an important thing for RHI to bring on youth sports.
Karen Lawrence:
Yeah. And really when RHI started, we started off with a water ski clinic. It was just an idea between therapists who saw the need, that there wasn’t anything for people to get to once they left the hospital. There was no community. So RHI sports has really tried to build a community for youth and adults alike. So now, when that water ski program started, that’s when we’re able to start building teams, and our newest team is, again, like the sled hockey and the blind hockey. So we just keep growing and trying to provide new opportunities because like Ricky said, if someone comes to us with an idea, something that they’re passionate about, we want to make sure that they can achieve that dream of theirs to participate in that specific sport.
Josh Anderson:
Excellent. Along those same lines, where do you see this program going in the future?
Karen Lawrence:
We hope to see it grow. Our hope is to be able to have a gym space over by our hospital to provide a place where all of our athletes can come together to create a bond that is not just with one team, but with all the teams and athletes. So a place where if someone’s unsure about participating at a specific sport, they can kind of come and watch it and feel comfortable watching it, and we hope that Indianapolis is not just known for their amateur sports, but for their adaptive sports as well.
Josh Anderson:
Ricky, Audie, I want to get just a little bit, or I want to talk to you guys just a little bit more. Audie, you just started your own company. Is that correct?
Audie Kemp:
That is correct.
Josh Anderson:
Can you tell us a little bit about that?
Audie Kemp:
The ATP Connect, I have worked in the rehab equipment industry for 22 years, and I’ve worked for smaller companies and large corporations, and what it is, is I actually do complex rehab chairs. So I’m a paraplegic. I use a titanium wheelchair, and so what I’ve done for the last 20 years has worked with new injuries or people with progressive disabilities, and I work with them to get their mobility equipment.
Audie Kemp:
So working for large corporations and other companies, I learned that a lot of times, the client doesn’t always get exactly what they need, even though that’s what insurance approves or does not approve. So what I’ve done is I’ve partnered with smaller rehab companies throughout the state to better serve the actual entire geographic areas. That way, when somebody gets their equipment from a larger hospital in Indianapolis like RHI, then your service technician and the company that takes care of them is more in their backyard, not here in Indianapolis. So the motto is centralized expertise, but local service, and that’s what I do.
Josh Anderson:
Very nice. Very nice. And Ricky, did you used to sell adaptive equipment as well?
Ricky Raley:
Yeah, it’s also for a larger company, and then I did a lot of fittings and for a lot of adaptive equipment like the adaptive sports equipment, so that’s kind of where I stayed, that realm, and I just noticed, what I always noticed was people are afraid to order that stuff, and the therapist and the doctors are afraid to prescribe it because they’re not exactly sure how to fit them for it, and then when it comes, it’s wrong. So what I was doing was specializing in helping people get the equipment they need fitted right because when you don’t understand is the equipment we have, those are our mobility.
Ricky Raley:
It’s how we get around, and then when there’s a long delay on it, my first bike came… When I got a bike from the VA for the first time, it took over a year to get it. Well, that’s great they got me a bike, but that year timeframe, you’re waiting, you’re waiting, you’re waiting. So there was no need for that long period and then when it came, it was wrong. So it’s kind of what drove me to that and that’s why Audie’s company that he just started, it’s amazing to see he’s finally going after that and help changing that model to give people, because the end user experience is everything and that’s what needs to be focused on.
Josh Anderson:
Well, very good. I’m glad you guys brought that up and Audie, I’m glad you’re doing that because I know that is, it seems like anytime any kind of mobility aid of any sort, there’s almost a thought that it’s one size fits all and that could not be farther from the truth.
Audie Kemp:
Absolutely.
Josh Anderson:
Well guys, if our listeners want to find out more about adaptive sports for veterans, about anything we talked about today, what’s the best way for them to do that?
Karen Lawrence:
Well, for the RHI Sports Program, they can follow us on Facebook, Instagram, or on our web page at rhirehab.com, or they can also just call or email us with any questions. They can call us at (317) 329-2020, or rhisports@rhin.com.
Josh Anderson:
Well guys, we’re kind of running out of time here, but I’d love to get just some last thoughts, some quick little things that you would say to someone who maybe has a disability, maybe a veteran who’s kind of coming back. What’s just some advice you’d give to them about sports and the importance of it?
Ricky Raley:
Embracing uncomfortable. You can only grow once you come out of it and go out and just try it and don’t give up. Anything Audie?
Audie Kemp:
For me, I would say don’t knock it until you try it, and then if you try it once, you’ll come back.
Ricky Raley:
And don’t break your friend’s arm.
Audie Kemp:
And don’t blame your friends for your own mistakes.
Josh Anderson:
All right. Well, very, very good. Karen, Ricky, Audie, thank you all so much for coming on the show today and talking to us all about adaptive sports.
Ricky Raley:
Thank you very much.
Josh Anderson:
Do you have a question about assistive technology? Do you have a suggestion for someone we should interview on assistive technology update? If you do, call our listener line at (317) 721-7124. Shoot us a note on Twitter at Indata Project, or check us out on Facebook. Are you looking for a transcript or show notes? Head on over to our website at www.Eastersealstech.com. Assistive technology update is a proud member of the accessibility channel. For more shows like this plus so much more, head over to accessibilitychannel.com. The views expressed by our guests are not necessarily that of this host or the Indata Project. This has been your assistive technology update. I’m Josh Anderson with the Indata Project at Easterseals Crossroads in Indianapolis, Indiana. Thank you so much for listening, and we’ll see you next time.