Timothy’s Story: An Adapttech Case Study

In this week’s blog post, we would like to present Timothy’s Case Study, which shows how important the INSIGHT System is in helping patients understand what is happening to their residual limb. One of the central goals of our technology is to facilitate and improve communication between the prosthetist and the patient. You can access all our case studies here.

TIMOTHY’S STORY 

Timothy is in the 50 to 64 age group and is retired. Despite his employment status, Timothy leads an active life: he cares for his two children and for his wife, and he enjoys gardening in his backyard and shopping.  

Timothy’s amputation was due to dysvascular complications, and he has only been using his prosthesis for 4 years. His weight category (more than 330lbs) has historically limited his prosthetic foot selection. Over the years, he has had to use feet that are very stiff to ensure they would not break on him. This caused more difficulty with rollover and made him feel like he had to “walk harder” with his prosthesis.  

PROBLEM 

The end of Timothy’s tibia is very broad and does not have tapering, typical of an ideal amputation. He has two very sharp corners present at the medial and lateral distal end of the tibia. These areas experience a constant breakdown in sockets that prior prosthetists have made for him. He frequently has skin breakdown and liner breakdown due to these areas rubbing. He then would put in gel pads over the areas to help cover up the broken-down liner. 

Timothy reports that he has had to go to several appointments with his prior prosthetist to get them to heat out the areas that are rubbing on his bone. He was told to always put a sock on, but his sock ply stayed consistent at a 3-5 ply sock on. He reported that it was taking up a lot of time for him to keep coming back for appointments to make changes all the time.  

Timothy’s residual limb

INSIGHT SOLUTION 

INSIGHT, Adapttech’s System designed to improve the efficiency of the fitting process to rapidly deliver an ultra-comfortable, uniquely fitted lower-limb prosthesis for the patient, was used in conjunction with a diagnostic socket and a new prosthetic foot that has much greater dynamics and can support Timothy’s weight and activity level. The prosthetist was able to verify a very snug proximal and mid-limb hold within the socket and was able to ensure that the reliefs built into the socket were actually in the proper location. 

By the end of the appointment, Timothy reported that the socket was the most comfortable he had ever felt it. Timothy took the diagnostic socket home for a trial and has been wearing it for over a week. He reports no skin breakdown at all and that his limb is actually starting to heal and look better. 

“This is just great. I don’t think I will have to keep coming back, time after time, for small adjustments. This will help me focus on my family and taking care of them. Although I love coming in to see everyone, I don’t want to spend all my time here. I’m really excited about what I’ve learned about my leg today,” said Timothy.