July 2004

Chiro product takes ‘gold’ in industrial design contest

A product used by chiropractors received “gold honors” in the Business Week-sponsored Industrial Design Excellence Awards (IDEA) contest, which recognizes the best and hottest product designed of the year.

The Electrotherapy and Ultrasound Systems line of equipment from the Chattanooga Group received the gold award in the medical products category.

IDEA is co-sponsored by the Industrial Designers Society of America (IDSA) and Business Week Magazine. IDSA is the nonprofit association that represents the profession of industrial design to education, business, government and the public and serves the profession’s needs for information and networking.

According to IDEA, “The unique modular design of this fully integrated suite of clinical electrotherapy equipment offers complete flexibility in the configuration and upgrade of the unit to meet the requirements of the individual therapist, at a fraction of the cost of the individual modalities. The mobile version was designed to be compact and lightweight to facilitate use away from the clinical environment at venues such as sporting events.”

IDSA official Amy Potts, principal in Potts Design in Westford, Mass.,, said, “This is a comprehensive system that uses a friendly interface to be less threatening. Its modularity makes it flexible enough to customize treatment sessions, which benefits both the user and the clients’ bottom line.”

Judging criteria for each entry fulfilled five areas of industrial design excellence: design innovation, benefit to the user, benefit to the client/business, ecological responsibility and appropriate aesthetics and appeal.

A jury of 17 non-affiliated designers spent two and half days to evaluate and debate the merits of each entry. “The jurors were challenged to weigh and award design contributions that varied from profoundly universal, sustainable and potentially life benefiting design solutions to ultra-simple, elegant and beautifully resonant forms,” said jury chair Ravi Sawhney, IDSA, President/CEO of RKS Design in Thousand Oaks, Calif.

Winners will be honored with a black tie ceremony in Los Angeles on October 30. The winners will be featured in the 2004 IDSA National Conference and Design Gallery. They were also featured in the Business Week IDEA report (July 5 issue).

Chattanooga Group is a division of Encore Medical Corporation, based in Austin, Texas.

Sources: Chattanooga Group, www.chattgroup.com; Industrial Design Excellence Awards, http://www.idsa.org.

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