In a message dated 98-09-14 22:50:22 EDT, [email protected] writes:
<< It was fabricated for her by a prosthetist "who came out and took some measurements and delivered the prosthesis a couple of days later". I explained to her that a cast of her residual limb would be required for a socket replacement and she again told me that the other prosthetist only took measurements. >>
How the times have changed…. Back in the very late 1960s when I worked for
J.E. Hanger in Philadelphia we would travel to Allentown and Reading with a
set of right and left brims from USMC that were split on the lateral side. We
would slip one of these brims onto the amputee and measure the gaping at the
top and the bottom and make a mark where the end of the stump came to in the
plastic brim. When we got back to the office we used tongue blade pieces and
masking tape to match the gaping we measured earlier. We would blowup a rubber
balloon and fit it in the socket to simulate the distal end of the stump and
lay some plaster wrap on to top. We then filled the brim and modified the
cast. On next trip we would fit the socket set up on an adjustable leg, and on
the third trip the prosthesis was delivered….. CAD/CAM of the 70s.
I remember a time when unmodified hip disarticulation and hemipelvectomy casts
were sent to central fabrication for fabrication and finishing with cover.
Some of these were never even aligned to the amputee before being delivered as
finished. Even today casts are being modified by central fabricators not the
prosthetists taking the cast.
Surely some of the measurement based CAD systems have improved the end result
over what we were doing as ABC certified prosthetists not that many years ago.
Al Pike, CP
