Back to Work

By Len Rosen

Lyndon Scholey is like a lot of business workers today. He works from home.

But Lyndon is also not like most business workers. Lyndon is paralyzed from the chest down and works while sitting in a head-controlled wheelchair. He uses his voice to talk to his computer, a system that includes a 486 PC with DragonDictate voice recognition technology, WordPerfect, Lotus 1-2-3, an electronic mail system, a high-speed modem, a fully automated page turner, and voice command software.

Lyndon broke his neck at his family cottage while diving into 16 feet of water. It was a freak accident -- his head struck a large inner tube that was floating on the surface of the water. Fracturing his neck instantly, he was saved only by the heroic efforts of his son, who witnessed the accident. Lyndon was rushed to a local Muskoka, Ontario hospital, stabilized and then sent to Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre in Toronto for the next 14 weeks. Lyndon no longer had the use of his arms and legs.

His first thoughts were more about survival than ever getting back into the work force. Lyndon was an office manager, a 26-year employee, at Canada Life. The father of two children, he was the sole financial provider in his family. Now he was fighting for his life.

Fourteen weeks at Sunnybrook were followed by 14 months at Lyndhurst Hospital, a rehabilitation facility in Toronto, where Lyndon received physio- and occupational therapy. Throughout it all he rode an emotional and physical roller coaster. He was fortunate to have a considerable amount of accumulated sick leave to help his family financially. When the sick leave coverage finally ran out, his long-term disability benefits kicked in, giving him 75% of his former salary.

To become mobile, Lyndon was outfitted with a head-controlled wheelchair. Retrofitting the house so he could live at home was the next step; his two-storey house was not designed for wheelchair accessibility. The double garage was converted into an apartment complete with a bathroom so that he could live and move around on the main floor.

About two months before leaving Lyndhurst, Lyndon was introduced to voice recognition technology. A representative from Kolvox, a Toronto firm specializing in voice recognition systems, came to Lyndhurst to do a demonstration. Dan Thompson, himself a quadriplegic as a result of a car accident, showed Lyndon how he used the system to do his job. Lyndon was impressed. Kolvox and Zurich Insurance together had donated a voice recognition system to the hospital, and Lyndon was able to practise on this system while he waited for his own to be delivered to his home.

When Lyndon finally came home almost a year and a half after the accident, it took him about a month to get acclimatized. Canada Life and Kolvox staff came to his home to set up and train him on his new voice recognition system. By January 1993, he was back at work. In his first month he managed about two hours per day. By the third month, he was working four hours. "Canada Life has been very supportive and helpful throughout," says Lyndon.

Lyndon is in the process of assembling a complete data dictionary for the Canada Life pension system.This project involves reading and commenting on more than 15,000 lines of COBOL code. He dials into the IBM mainframe at Canada Life’s downtown offices at University and Queen, and downloads the COBOL program modules into WordPerfect on his home PC. Then he enters his comments and notes. As he completes each module of the program, he transmits the finished commented code back to the company where it is further reviewed by other Canada Life systems staff and returned to him for final corrections.

Lyndon is still learning to master the art of talking to his computer. "I’m still pretty slow," he relates, "but I’m starting to see my speed pick up." He can even use his voice system to set up appointments using the company’s e-mail package located on the mainframe. He sends and receives messages electronically, sets up his appointments, and generally keeps in touch with the rest of the staff. He commutes from his Bramalea home to downtown Toronto twice a month, on average, for office meetings.

Kolvox has seen many people in predicaments similar to Lyndon’s. The company has helped more than 100 clients in the last two years to get back to work after disabling injuries. Insurance adjuster David Kalicharan recently talked about the work that Kolvox does with people with disabilities. "They are in the business of providing immediate, practical and effective solutions to people with physical impairments, so that they can become economically and socially independent."

When Kolvox is first approached by a prospective client, the company does an in-depth assessment of the work place requirements for the individual who will use the voice system. This is followed by numerous planning sessions and, once implementation is complete, several days of training. Users can become quite proficient after a few weeks of continuous daily practice.

"I feel that voice input has made my return to work practical," says Lyndon. "Without it, I would not have been able to get back to work at all."

(Len Rosen is the Marketing Manager of Kolvox Incorporated.)