Julie’s Journey to get Luci

Driving a power wheelchair can be difficult, there’s lots of things in our environment that we have to navigate through, curbs, cracks in sidewalks, crowds of people, tight doorways, and obstacles that can appear suddenly that we have to move around. Being visually impaired can make this even more difficult for me. It can be hard to see things like the edges of a curb, or how close I am to things that are in my way. Luci is a technology system that can be added to my wheelchair that removes some of the stress of driving in a power wheelchair. Luci has sensors all around a chair that can sense if a user is about to collide into something, or go over a curb and will automatically stop the chair right before the collision, and then it will resume the chairs movement if the user is heading around or away from the collision, or if the object gets moved before the chair hits it. Luci helps people navigate through the world more safely. For me in particular that means no more accidentally driving off curbs and falling out of my chair and getting hurt. But like most amazing medical technology, Luci is expensive and isn’t deemed medically necessary so it isn’t covered by insurance. Luci costs $8445. Although Luci would dramatically improve my safety and my quality of life, I can’t pay for it all my own. So I’m setting up a fundraiser so that people in my community can help me pay for it.