TIDEWALK: A TRANSDISCIPLINARY DESIGN ECOSYSTEM FOR SUPPORTING DAILY AUTONOMY IN PARKINSON'S DISEASE

Parkinson's Disease progressively disrupts not just motor function but the entire fabric of daily life affecting independence, social participation, and caregiver wellbeing simultaneously. Existing assistive interventions tend to address isolated symptoms within clinical settings, failing to account for the unpredictable, domestic reality of living with the condition. This research investigates how a human-centred design approach can produce an integrated ecosystem of touchpoints that supports patients across motor, cognitive, and emotional dimensions within the home environment, with specific attention to India's early-onset cohort and the systemic care gaps unique to low-to-middle income urban contexts. The project employs a transdisciplinary design research methodology combining secondary literature synthesis, expert consultation with neurological practitioners, and qualitative user journey mapping. A behavioural adoption framework grounded in the Push-Pull-Habit-Anxiety model was used to identify systemic barriers to assistive technology uptake among India's Parkinson's population, particularly within Stages 1 to 3. Insights were synthesised into design principles that informed an ecosystem-level intervention spanning wearable stabilisation hardware, an AI-driven symptom monitoring companion, and caregiver coordination tools. Research revealed three compounding failure modes in current care: the unpredictability of on/off motor fluctuation cycles across the day, the near-total neglect of non-motor symptoms including fatigue, anxiety, and sleep disruption in technology design, and high device abandonment rates driven by social stigma. India-specific factors including geographic care dispersion, caregiver burnout, and affordability constraints further widen the gap between clinical intervention and lived experience. The resulting Tidewalk ecosystem proposes a low-cost, stigma-conscious design framework that decentralises chronic condition management, distributing support across physical, digital, and service touchpoints while generating longitudinal data that improves remote care quality and caregiver confidence. This work contributes a replicable ecosystem-level design methodology for chronic neurological conditions in low-to-middle income contexts, moving beyond single-product intervention toward a holistic sociotechnical framework grounded in dignity, daily rhythm, and caregiver equity.