Remember years past, when teachers would have you place books on your head to walk across the room without dropping them? The idea was to help you develop good posture.

Good posture is key to good balance, and that’s the message that clinical physical therapist Dr. Abhishek Kumar and his team, currently based in Gainesville, are trying to get across with their patented and trademarked Fallgard™ device that helps correct bad posture before it leads to a fall.

“We cannot keep telling people to stand up straight and walk properly,” Kumar said. “A  patient may walk fine when a therapist is with them, but once the therapist is gone, they revert to old habits.

“We started thinking about a process, and we came up with a small gadget, kind of a ‘little buddy.’ It is a small computer camera-based intelligent gadget. It goes into the walker and scans your posture all the time. It is a postural mapping,” he said.

The U.S Centers for Disease Control and Prevention finds that falls are the leading cause of injury for adults over age 65. Over 14 million, or one in four adults in that demographic, report falling each year.

“Falls among adults aged 65 and older are common, costly, and preventable. Falls are the leading cause of fatal and nonfatal injuries among older adults,” according to the CDC.

Kumar’s goal is to be able to prevent a fall before it happens, perhaps avoiding hospitalization and keeping people functionally active at home, Kumar said.

Kumar is a founder and managing director of Fallgard™. The website, www.fallgard.com, describes it as a non-wearable device to assist individuals using mobility aids such as walkers. It uses advanced sensor systems, an AI-enhanced camera platform, and machine learning algorithms.

The device aims to provide real-time posture mapping, continuous monitoring, and accurate detection of fall-related deviations. It beeps a warning for posture correction and will say, “Please stand straight.”

Fallgard™ assists users in maintaining optimal balance and alignment, “significantly reducing the risk of falls and preventing the life-altering consequences of injury, disability, or loss of life,” according to the company website.

The device is already being used in India, where the company is based, although team leaders like Kumar have studied and worked around the world.  Kumar says the company hopes to make the product available in the United States soon.

Kumar said he began working with Dr. Veena Antony, described on the website as the company’s mentor. The founding members have expertise in the medical and health fields as well as artificial intelligence, computer science, and the world of start-ups.

“It took us three and a half years to come up with the first prototype,” Kumar said, although more advanced models are now available. A patent was filed in India in April 2025.

Costs are still to be determined, but Kumar said the device would be affordable to the level that a consumer can purchase it without insurance.

Empathy got Kumar interested in fall prevention. This came after the death of one of his patients, also a friend, who fell repeatedly.

“He was a World War II veteran with several impairments and was falling all the time,” Kumar said.  “He had poor postural awareness and was swaying left and right. One time, he fell and fractured his hip and ankle and never recovered.”

That’s something he hopes to be able to avoid.

“This gadget will give an objective assessment of how much of a fall risk you might be,” he said.