This email was originially sent to John Goldthwaite. Please respond to Shinji
Miyazaki, PhD directly. 


Dear John Goldthwaite:

I am a Rehabilitation Engineer working for Tokyo Medical and Dental
University and a member of the Communication SIG of Rehabilitation
Engineering Society of Japan.  

Recently, I have been trying to use "Touchfree Switch" system, which was
developed jointly by IBM and EDMARK(WA) and is now sold by Riverdeep
Inc.(WA). The system combines a PC digital camera with a switch software so
that body motion be transformed to a software mouse left click signal. Any
motion can be detected, but I am particularly interested in minute motions
such as eye blink and eye brow shrinkage of patients with severe
neuromuscular diseases; ALS, SCD, muscular dystrophy, etc. who have
difficulties in using conventional mechanical switches. A new software "Pete"
developed by Allied Brains Co. Ltd. (Tokyo) with a financial support from the
Japanese government receives this software mouse click signal as "one switch
input" and operates a software keyboard (Japanese and English). Pete has a
unique function which can operate popular MS softwares run under MS Windows;
Word, Excel, Outlook Express, etc.  

I am in a first phase of field test with a small number of patients. Thus, I
would be very grateful if you could kindly give me information on any similar
trials in U.S.A. I would like to share experiences with those people to
perform the field test most efficiently and effectively. If you yourself are
not an expert in this field, please refer me to appropriate persons arround
you.  

Thanking you in advance.

Shinji Miyazaki, Ph.D.
Inst. Biomaterials & Bioengng.
Tokyo Medical & Dental University
phone: +81-3-5280-8088
fax:   +81-3-5280-8049
miyazaki.bmi@tmd.ac.jp