ASU students create clothes for children undergoing chemo

Arizona State University fashion and engineering students collaborated in a unique, wearable fashion class to create special clothes for kids undergoing chemotherapy.

Students created devices to calm the kids, monitor their health signs, make them laugh and distract them. The garments were also soft, warm, and adaptable to medical treatment.

A sensor and microcontroller computer within the garment tracks the child’s breathing patterns, providing a real-time connection to the child’s respiratory activity. What sets this jacket apart is the designed butterfly, strategically positioned on the garment.

Through the creation of a smaller motor within the butterfly, the jacket monitors the child’s pulse rate and then provides personalized breathing directions with the pulse. As the child breathes in and out, the butterfly opens and closes, serving as a visual guide for therapeutic and rhythmic breathing.

Galina Mihaleva, Ph.D., associate professor at the School of Art at ASU, and Shawn Jordan, associate professor of engineering at the Ira A. Fulton School of Engineering at ASU, oversaw the class and joined Arizona Horizon to explain the student’s undertakings.