Ilizarov procedure in St-Petersburg ?

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Hey,

I'm a 20 year old student from Western Europe and I plan to go for external lengthening on tibias from next summer. I would like to receive some feedbacks about my project.

Dr Solomin seems to be a very experienced doctor, and his services are very cheap. As I would like to lengthen 4.5 cm, and as I'm young, I expect to be done and back to normal life about 6 months after the surgery. Is it a reasonable expectation ? I think 4.5 cm can be lengthened in less than 2.5 months after the surgery, and after this time, I would like to go back to my place and consolidate at home before flying back to Russia a last lime for removal. Is it possible ? Money could be an issue, I only have 6000 € + 4000 € that I will borrow from a close person. I don't want to wait before doing it for several reasons : the younger, the better ; if things turn bad, as the medical care of my country is excellent and entirely free, I won't stay in such a bad situation, but this medical care is living its last months ; people won't be shocked if I grow a bit tall at 20 ; etc.
The most stressful point of this project remains the Russian visa system : the tourism visa only allows for a duration stay of 30 days, unless the surgery is made in MEDEM clinic which charges much higher fees for everything.

Could you give me advices and opinions about everything ?

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Look in to Dr. Mitkovic too. He does external tibias with his own device and you can remove it yourself at home (9300€ euros).  I heard that with Dr. Solomin there is no after care and I read a diary on here about somebody's fixator breaking and he had trouble with Solomin so I crossed him off my list.

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Mitkovic seems great but his price is more than 2 x Solomin's. I also read the diary you refer to, and the author was saying it was a rare problem and denied the doctors responsibility. I'll try to speak with Dr Solomin about this peculiar event, it's still worrying indeed.