We caught up with Jamie Hamilton in York, UK, weaving through the city’s cobbled streets and past the historic timber-framed shopfronts of the Shambles – the kind of uneven, characterful terrain that makes independent mobility anything but simple.
Jamie runs his own occupational therapy business in the North of England, working with children and adults with physical disabilities, mental health and neurodivergent conditions, and he teaches wheelchair skills training to individuals and groups. Outside work, he chases the active, outdoor life he loves.
Jamie is also a former elite athlete – a 40-year wheelchair basketball career took him into the Premier League and European tournaments, and he has represented Great Britain in fencing, winter sports and wheelchair racing. Jamie has spina bifida, and is paralysed from almost the waist down. He’s been a wheelchair user since he was 15. He’s also part of a world-record-holding team of wheelchair users who pulled a Boeing 737 one hundred metres at Heathrow Airport in 2019 – a record that still stands.
For Jamie, independence is the foundation of everything he does, and he’d rather solve a problem than avoid it:
“My whole life is about being independent, I love being active, whether it’s sports, work, just socialising in general. It’s a really important part for me. I enjoy the challenge of finding different ways to accomplish activities and tasks.”
Finding the Right Support
Before switching to the Zygo Active Mid Back Support, Jamie used a canvas back support – and it came with problems that quietly wore him down over time. He’d tried many seating systems over the years without finding one comfortable or supportive enough – they always needed adjusting or replacing fairly often.
“It often got quite saggy,” he explains. “And when you did tighten it up, it got too tight, and then the straps were digging into me. It just irritated my back as well.”
It’s a familiar trade-off for a lot of wheelchair users: loosen the support and lose the postural support or tighten it and live with discomfort. Jamie needed something that didn’t force him to choose.
A New Level of Support
Switching to the Zygo back support meant he no longer had to choose. Shaped to run from the base of Jamie’s spine to the middle of his back, it gave him more consistent support without the constant adjusting. He adapted to it quickly, and noticed a difference he wasn’t expecting: “I always felt I sat straight, but the Zygo backrest has improved it further.”
“The Zygo back rest gave me a lot more support,” Jamie says. “It improved my posture. It offered me more comfort as well, and because it goes from the base of my spine to the middle of my back, it’s made me more comfortable.”
That extra comfort has made a real difference to his day-to-day energy levels. “I’m not getting so tired, and I’m not getting so irritated by having to always fiddle with the back. Whereas this one, I leave it in place now because it’s really comfortable.”
Jamie has even noticed benefits beyond posture and comfort.
“I’ve tried other back rest supports on my chairs, but I found this one to be one of the best, because it’s actually improved my posture, my breathing, my digestion. I’m taking a lot more, bigger breaths when I’m breathing, and that allows me to have much more energy and less fatigue.”
Jamie in his Zygo Active Mid Back Support, providing support throughout York’s cobblestoned streets.
Staying Active, Staying Independent
Jamie and his wife share a love of the outdoors and exploring new places – from York’s cobbled lanes to wherever the next trip takes them – and that’s exactly where the difference has been most noticeable.
“Both of us love being outdoors, and we love going to new places. Just having the Zygo back rest has actually made that more possible for longer, because I’m not getting so tired. I’m not in so much pain. So it’s nice to be out and enjoy life.”
The practical design has helped too. The Zygo is built for single-handed removal, using two simple tabs on the back of the shell.
“It’s very easy to remove. It’s just two little tabs on the back of the back rest – you push them to one side and lift it off. It’s incredibly easy,” Jamie says. “It reduces the weight of the wheelchair as well, so again, it’s saving my shoulders, it’s saving my back.”
For someone who self-propels through work, sport and everyday life, small savings in effort add up – and they matter.
The Spex Difference
Jamie is also quick to credit the person behind the product: Dan, the Spex representative who visited to fit his equipment.
“The guy – the rep that came down to see me, called Dan – was excellent. He spent a lot of time with me getting the back rest right, finding the right back rest height and back rest style, and putting it in different positions, trying different things. He was really patient, just to make sure that I got the right bit of equipment for what I needed.”
Even the best equipment only does its job when it’s set up for the person using it, which is exactly why Zygo is scripted to each user’s own measurements rather than a generic chair size.
More Than a Back Support
For Jamie, the Zygo back support has become one more piece of equipment that quietly gets out of the way, so he can get on with the things that matter – work, sport, travel, and time outdoors with the people he loves.
“It’s nice to be out and enjoy life.”
