by Jon

Great visit today with Poppy, Will (and Noah!) to the hospital's COMPASS centre, where the tireless staff constantly develop and refine the amazing hi (and often lo)-tech technological solutions enabling patients to communicate and interact. We were welcomed and shown round by team member Marc Viera, who gave us a whistle-stop tour of the various communication devices used by patients, ranging from the EyeGaze system which allows the user to control a computer cursor using just eye movements (which as Poppy discovered is much harder than it looks...) to a whole range of ingenious devices controlled by different kinds of switches and triggers. One of the most fascinating aspects of the COMPASS team's work is how the smallest flicker of physical capacity on the part of an individual patient can be exploited to create a completely personalised / bespoke communication / facilitation system. The journey towards communication is becoming a key part of the libretto, so I'm sure we'll be back for a repeat visit some time soon...