The ERN Story

The Exceed Research Network (ERN) is ten years old in 2025. We’re taking this opportunity to tell the ERN story, starting with how the Network started and developed. We’ll follow this by looking at ERN’s achievements and impacts.

The ERN Story

The Exceed Research Network (ERN) was founded in 2015 with a clear purpose. At that time the need for research and data for the disability sector, especially in lower resource settings, was widely recognised and ERN was established to address this gap.

ERN emerged when Exceed Worldwide, which is a leader in the provision of prosthetics and orthotics (P&O) education and services in lower resource countries, reached out to the university and business sectors. The goal was to create a research consortium which would combine the academic discipline of professional researchers with the experience of disability practitioners to drive high quality applied research and support the work of Exceed Worldwide and other P&O service providers.

ERN member Mike Berthaume

The Exceed Research Network first convened in February 2015. What began as a small gathering has become a multi-national network with members representing organisations that work in Africa, Asia-Pacific, Europe, North America, South Asia and Southeast Asia. ERN is now a unique, multi-sector, voluntary network of experts involving 32 organisations, including universities, NGOs, P&O businesses and public sector bodies. Its 45 individual members include eminent researchers and disability practitioners with a wide range of capabilities.

These include disability policy; health systems; P&O education and services; bio-engineering; P&O device development and use; ethical research and service provision; outcomes and effectiveness measures; disability measurement and statistics; ethical data access and analysis; health economics; mental health; poverty and social inequality; physiotherapy; quantitative and qualitative research; PO business; market research and the development of new, sustainable P&O service models.

This rich mix of expertise enables ERN to form cross-sector consortia to carry out funded and unfunded research, centred on P&O and wider disability issues in lower resource settings. Through high-quality, high-impact activities, ERN shapes the research agenda by setting research and ethical standards, building capacity, improving the lives of people with disability and disseminating knowledge on disability research and its impact in lower-resource countries.

Tenth Anniversary of the Exceed Research Network

The Exceed Research Network, or ERN, was founded in February 2015.

Its aim is to carry out applied research in lower resource settings, focusing on prosthetics and orthotics (PO) and wider disability issues. ERN brings together universities, NGOs, PO businesses, PO educators and practitioners and health service professionals, to carry out consortium-led, ethical, informed, applied and impactful scientific and social research.

Over ten years, this work has benefited people with disabilities, built research capacity in lower resource locations, shaped research practice, informed the development sector and supported the work of Exceed Worldwide.

To mark the 10th Anniversary of the Network, information about ERN will be published regularly on Exceed communications platforms in 2025, so look out for more as the year moves on.

Regional Educators' visits in Cambodia

Regional Educators visited people with disabilities and their families during the annual meeting for Regional Leaders in Prosthetic and Orthotic Education in Cambodia.

Prosthetic and Orthotic educators from Southeast and South Asia completed their time in Cambodia by visiting the Department of Prosthetics and Orthotics at the National Institute of Social Affairs in Phnom Penh.

Regional PO Educators Visit Central Hospital in Phnom Penh

Leading prosthetic and orthotic (PO) educators from Southeast and South Asia visited the Central Hospital in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, as part of their annual PO educators meeting.

The Central Hospital is a major private hospital in Phnom Penh and, as part of the visit, Carolyn Wilson, a UK-based physiotherapist who specialises in amputee rehabilitation, delivered a presentation about the benefits of an inter-disciplinary approach to amputee rehabilitation.

Exceed's social enterprise provides private PO services at the Central Hospital, in partnership with the hospital's management.

Regional PO educators from South and Southeast Asia visited the National Paediatric Hospital in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, as part of their regional meeting for PO leaders.

Regional PO Educators Meet on International Day for People with Disabilities

Leaders from Prosthetic and Orthotic (PO) Schools in Southeast and South Asia are meeting in Phnom Penh, Cambodia from 2-4 December, a period which includes the International Day for People with Disabilities on 3rd December.

PO schools provide an essential service for people with physical disabilities by training PO clinicians and technicians to assess patients and make, fit, repair and replace prosthetic and orthotic devices like artificial limbs, leg braces and spinal braces.

PO services treat men, women and children with a wide range of conditions, including amputation, scoliosis, cerebral palsy, polio, diabetes and many other conditions.

PO patients often require lifelong support which can only be provided by trained professionals and PO Schools have an essential in supporting people with disabilities, by restoring mobility and enabling patients to have an independent life and contribute to society as employees, taxpayers and active community members.

The PO Educators meeting in Phnom Penh is being attended by schools from Bangladesh, Cambodia, Indonesia, Malaysia, Myanmar, Sri Lanka, the Philippines and Thailand and their aim is to work together more closely, to grow the PO profession and support many more people with disabilities.