Allen Siekman Consulting

Biography

Allen Siekman has 30 years of clinical experience as a seating specialist, designer and educator, specializing in the design and provision of seating equipment for children and adults with moderate to severe physical challenges.

He served as the Head of the Seating and Mobility department at the Rehabilitation Engineering Center at Children’s’ Hospital at Stanford in Palo Alto, California for 14 years. In 1991 he was recruited by Invacare Corporation to head their new seating products division. He was the Marketing and Product Manager for Seating at Invacare Corporation for 6 years. During this time Mr. Siekman was responsible for new product development, marketing, testing and clinical training (awarded two US patients for seat cushion design).

Mr. Siekman left his management position as the Director of Seating and Design at Beneficial Designs (Minden NV, USA) in 2004 to start his own consulting and testing firm, Allen Siekman Consulting/Central Coast Testing.

He is the Chair of the US working group that is developing international standards for wheelchair seating (ISO-16840 Wheelchair Seating Standards development). As a member of the standards working group Mr. Siekman has helped develop a series of tests for wheelchair cushion performance and participated in the clinical validation of new test procedures (some of which have been adopted by SADMERC for Medicare cushion testing). He remains involved in many professional endeavors related to wheelchair seating.

Mr. Siekman has been actively involved in RESNA - The Rehabilitation Engineering and Assistive Technology Society of North America since its inception. He has been a popular instructor at the annual RESNA National Conference and the International Seating Symposium. Mr. Siekman also continues to present workshops and seminars on Wheelchair Seating to varied audiences worldwide. Allen is a RESNA representative to the National Pressure Ulcer Advisory Panel (NPUAP) and is a contributing member to the Support Surface Initiative group, working on the development of testing methodologies for support surfaces.

Allen Siekman Consulting provides design and product development services related to Wheelchair Seating and Support Surfaces for large and small corporations in the US and Europe. This work includes seat cushion and backrest design, testing consultation, staff and consumer education and training, and product specific clinical training.

The testing arm of the business, Central Coast Testing, provides wheelchair cushion testing to meet the Medicare cushion testing requirements. Additional testing for specific product design/development projects for wheelchair cushions and support surfaces (mattresses) is also provided directly to manufacturers. These include human subject studies of wheelchair seat cushions, seating systems and support surfaces.