The first session of the National Hackathon Series -‘Wearables Edition‘- was held last 25-29 July in Ado Ekiti, South-West Nigeria, organised by Vilsquare Makers’ Hub and Meluibe Foundation. The aim of the Series is to combine technology and civic participation towards solving problems around national unity, while working on specific needs.
This first edition produced wearable hardware technology prototypes responding to UN SDG 3: Good health and well being. The subsequent hackathons will be held in each of the other 5 Nigeria geo-political zones over an 18-month period, tackling a different SDG each time.
Participants, who had previously never met each other, had to work collaboratively to design and develop these solutions in a short time frame.
The projects designed during the Wearables Hackathon are:
– Wearable Massage Vest: Helps reducing back pain caused as a result of sitting for long periods of time during driving and other back pain causes
– Medication Dosage Reminder: Prompts schedule and reminders of medication intake for patients
– Wearable Cigarette Smoke Detector: Helps people monitoring the threshold of harmful smoke concentrations, reducing passive smoking casualties.
– Heart rate monitoring bracelet for pregnant women: Monitors the heart pump rate for pre and post-pregnancy.
– Medical history logger for travellers: Provides travellers with a log of their medical information in which they can store blood type, past medical complications and other details. Helps the traveller getting immediate medical attention in case of an emergency.
Photographs, manuals, circuit diagrams, source codes, development kits and more information on all the products from this Hackathon are available at Vilsquare’s site.
The Global Open Science Hardware (GOSH) Roadmap was also presented and discussed at the event, as Vilsquare Makers’ Hub is part of the GOSH Movement and participated in last AfricaOSH Summit.
“We believe science and technology should be open and free to all,” says Obasegun Ayodele, co-founder of Vilsquare. “Our goal is to build a community of 10 million Makers over the next five years, who are passionate and geared towards peace advocacy in conflict regions of Africa through the adoption of Open Science and Hardware.”