EAST LANSING, Mich. – Two Michigan State University engineering researchers have developed an innovative chair that does much more than just provide a place to sit.
The invention, named the “2025 MSU Innovation of the Year,” aims to solve a painful and costly problem faced by patients with limited mobility.
The “Sit Sense” chair looks like a normal reclining chair but is equipped with sensors that detect a person’s needs and automatically adjust its position.
“No other chair moves like this,” said MSU mechanical engineering professor Tamara Reid Bush. “It has sensors, so it can sense what a person needs and move automatically.”
Patients who cannot move on their own often require nurses to physically reposition them. If not moved frequently enough, these patients risk developing pressure injuries, also known as bed sores.
“We saw some of them being treated,” Bush said. “They are deep, penetrating wounds that can get infected and are very, very difficult to heal.”
Together with Justin Scott, Ph.D., an MSU research associate, Bush created the Sit Sense chair to move patients through different positions to prevent these injuries.
“I didn’t know that this was such an issue, that pressure injuries affected so many people,” Scott said.
The chair cycles through 12 main positions, but caregivers can customize its movements to meet individual patient needs.
“Each position offloads an area of the body, so if you think of tissue being compressed, each position will uncompress a tissue that was previously compressed,” Scott said.
The invention also addresses challenges faced by nurses, especially amid a statewide nursing shortage and increasing patient sizes.
“The difficulty in repositioning a patient is becoming more challenging,” Bush said. “This will help support the nurses in their job duties.”
The cost to treat a single pressure injury can range from $20,000 to $150,000, making prevention key.
Right now, the goal is to get the Sit Sense chair into hospitals, but the team also hopes to develop a wheelchair version so people using wheelchairs can receive the same benefits.