Quote from: Body Builder on April 19, 2018, 12:09:14 AMI dont believe any bone graft could fix an 8cm gap.
The best for you is geting a precise 2 nail (even better stryde which is fully weight bearing when it comes out), shortn up to 3 cm, do a trauma in your bone edges to provoke a new bone bridge and then start slowly lengthen again.
I think that this solution has the best chances to succeed and solve your problem completely. I wonder why doctors dont try it and recommend bone grafts and all this bs in a huge 8cm gap which are almost sure to fail.
Also, you've been right about many things. We were so blind towards the procedure we received. And with the latest nail break, we recognize that everything we were sold were scams and lies. We were under a form of Stockholm Sydrome since our doctor was very dominant, always disapproving and psychologically abusive.
The fact that we had to do useless pre-training so the doctor can charge an additional £3k for it. 2-4 weeks of muscle training before surgery makes zero difference and the cybex tests to measure muscle improvements (at an additional charge, of course) were all circus hoops for us to jump through. From my experience, if anything can help, it's to stretch and improve flexibility and even that cannot be achieved in a mere 1 month.
Even the psychological test where we had to pay an astronomical sum so that we can provide the doctor a cover should anything go wrong (same thing with the motivational essay he forces us to write). There is no way a psych can evaluate how fit we are mentally for this procedure under the constraints of 60 minutes. Let's be clear - if you're willing to pay an exorbitant price to get your legs broken and then lengthened = you ARE crazy to some degree. And what about the classmates who failed, and then magically pass after they pay additional thousands of pounds to another psych?
Post surgery, even same day upon waking up from general anaesthesia, making us walk using our frames, climbing stairs (!!!) and cycling (you cannot imagine how painful it is trying to get up on the stationary bike when you've 2 broken legs, are dizzy and in excruciating pain) do not make you heal faster but rather exposes you to unnecessary risks and danger of falling (which some classmates did).
And then forcing us to go to physio everyday where most of us endure 20-30 minutes stress of taxi hell, and then frame hopping to the gym hallway (most of the time, we don't even have our own room so we exercise in the hallway! with gym folks gingerly walking between our legs) so that we can do some leg lifts that we could easily do at home. The PT is not even allowed to touch us, much less contribute to anything at all. Going to Isokinetic is even worse, we're left there by ourselves most of the time to be told by our designated PT to stretch. That's about it. And once in a while, we get a consultation with the Isokinetic doctor who is merely a glorified PA noting our complaints and dispenses painkillers/sleeping pills.
Best of all is the bi-weekly consultations with the doctor, who is constantly late by several hours, and when we finally get to see him, he never has our results in front of him because his server is not working, the hospital hasn't sent it - it's always one excuse or another and we leave with exactly the same info as when we arrive, no idea of our LL progress. But we're constantly reminded how lucky we are to be followed by him personally at no extra charge.
In hindsight, these are all reckless endangerment and they do not contribute to fast bone consolidation. These are just to justify the high fees of the doctor which he will sell to you as a great deal because you're getting so much physio, isokinetic and consultations in one package.
Best of all is the torture device. Those of you who've done manual clicking will know how crazy it is, to be twisting your leg in weird positions, fresh after they've been broken, 15 times a day for 60 days. It's mental anguish and trauma. Simply get anyone who's broken anything to bend their broken bone in 90 degree angles 15x a day, see their reaction (if they don't punch you in the face first). The pain, the frustration, the dread, the nightmares that follow afterwards, the PTSD ensues.
While it is true that weight bearing might help with bone growth, it plays such a small part when you factor in other attributes like genetics, diet, age, gender - anyone who's plastered up with a leg cast hanging in the air, being immobile for a month, will still FUSE. There is zero need to perform the circus stunts prescribed by our doctor.
At the end of the day, it's all just to justify his ego and price. This is the hindsight and conclusion we've come to, after seeing our classmate's recent gnail break; when we've all paid a hefty price for the "best doctor" for a fully weight bearing and "strongest nail" in the world (it's not even titanium, just stainless steel). All BS. And all those youtube success videos? Staged. It's not the doctor who makes successful stories, young male LLers ARE naturally the best candidates for this procedure.
The gnail belongs to a museum of medieval torture devices.
It's almost 2 years now since I had my initial LL surgery. My left leg which was fractured during 1st surgery has now finished lengthening and fused beautifully.