Category: Amputation

Andy Grant defies odds to become runner after waking up from operation to remove leg below knee and finding key word missing from You’ll Never Walk Alone tattoo

On By A.P.In Amputation, amputeeLeave a comment

A Royal Marine who had his leg blown off, leaving his Liverpool FC tattoo missing a word and reading You’ll Never Walk, has defied the odds to become a runner and climber.

Andy Grant, 26, had his limb amputated after he stood on an improvised explosive device (IED) while on routine foot patrol in Afghanistan.

He had an operation to remove the leg below the knee and woke up to find the word Alone missing from his You’ll Never Walk Alone tattoo.

However, the father of three used the ironic inking as inspiration and went through vigorous rehabilitation sessions for 18 months.

He has not only learnt to walk, but is now closing in on a running world record.

Mr Grant, who lives in Liverpool and was serving with 45 Commando at the time of the blast, said he has always seen the funny side.

He said: “I am a huge Liverpool fan so had the Liver bird and the words to the song You’ll Never Walk Alone on my leg.

“The tattoo that I have been left with has always been a bit of a joke. I use it in my motivational speeches.

“It is ironic that it says I will never walk as I have gone on to run 10k in 40 mins. At the moment I am just two minutes off a record record for the 10k for a single leg amputee and I have that in my sights.

“It is bizarre and I just laugh about it. But it adds to my story I guess. The fact is that regardless of what the words says, the operation allowed me to walk and run and do so much else. You have got to see the funny side of it.

“I also won a couple of gold medals at the Invictus Games and got to abseil the shard so I don’t think I have done too badly.

“I guess I did use the tattoo I was left with as an extra inspiration. But I was always going to prove it wrong.”

The impact of the IED blast in Sangin six years ago severed Mr Grant’s femoral artery and took out a “big chunk” of his thigh. He broke both the fibula and tibia in his right leg and lost 6cm of bone.

But two years after the blast, the 26-year-old decided to have his right leg amputated after watching comrades with similar injuries enjoying activities with their prosthetic legs.

He can still recall the conversation he had with surgeon Anthony Lambert when he woke up.

Mr Lambert told him: “Well, we had to raise a flap of skin on your leg to cover the bone ends… and it’s meant that your Liverpool Football Club tattoos are a bit messed up. The Liver bird is a bit all over the place, and your tattoo now says ‘you’ll never walk’.”

The date of his blast, February 3, and the date of his amputation, November 25, are both anniversaries that Andy marks.

He said: “The anniversary of the blast is a bitter sweet day, but one that I like to get together with friends and family.

“I am very proud of my achievements and like to turn my story around to try and inspire other people about what they can achieve in the face of adversity.

“I am all about looking forward. I can not undo what happened and I have no regrets. I am all about making the best of a bad situation.”

Such is his positive outlook on life now, he says he feels like the bomb blast was “worthwhile”.

He said: “It’s been a rollercoaster ride of emotions, and it’s been bittersweet for me. On that day in 2009 I basically ended my career in the corps. I lost a bit of myself on that day and, as a 20-year-old I changed.

“It’s been hard when you look at it like that, but on the flip side I’ve had some amazing experiences that almost make it seem like it was worthwhile.

“It is weird to hear myself say that, but it just shows the level of recovery. It’s opened so many doors.

“My job as an inspirational speaker takes me around the world; I’ve started amazing relationships with people; I have three children and an amazing family; I’m looking to row across the Atlantic; and I’m hoping to be picked for the Paralympics next year.

“My life has moved on in an amazing way and it’s all down to what happened. It’s given me more of a life than I probably would have had.”

The Liverpool Football Club fan left the Royal Marines in May, 2012 and now works as a motivational speaker.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/defence/11394618/Royal-Marines-Liverpool-FC-tattoo-reads-Youll-Never-Walk-after-amputation.html

Congregation of stray dogs in Poland reveals that amputated limbs were dumped in warehouse

On By A.P.In Amputation, amputee, Crime, Dogs, Human Behavior, PolandLeave a comment

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A Polish businessman who tried to save money by stashing amputated body parts in warehouses instead of incinerating them was exposed by the nose of man’s best friend, prosecutors said.

Stray dogs, attracted by the smell, started gathering outside the warehouses, Polish television quoted prosecutors as saying on Friday.

Police were alerted and made the grisly discovery when they searched the compound, broadcaster TVN CNBC reported.

The owner of the company, in the southern city of Katowice, could be sentenced to up to 12 years in prison for endangering public health, the station quoted prosecutors as saying.

Prosecutors could not immediately be reached for comment.

According to the report, the company had contracts with around 300 medical hospitals and clinics to dispose of medical waste, which included amputated body parts.

The broadcaster reported that the company initially buried the waste underground at a private plot, and when space ran out, started using the warehouses. Prosecutors found 100 tonnes of medical waste that the firm had failed to dispose of properly, it said.

http://cnews.canoe.ca/CNEWS/WeirdNews/2013/05/10/20812016.html

New bionic hand allows person to feel what they are touching

On By A.P.In Amputation, amputee, Association for the Advancement of Science, bionic hand, Boston, Ecole Polytechnique Federale de Lausanne, Engineering, Kebmodee, Pierpaolo Petruzziello, Rome, Silvestro Micera, Switzerland, The Future, The SingularityLeave a comment

2-bionic-handsBionic-handv1

The first bionic hand that allows an amputee to feel what they are touching will be transplanted later this year in a pioneering operation that could introduce a new generation of artificial limbs with sensory perception.

The patient is an unnamed man in his 20s living in Rome who lost the lower part of his arm following an accident, said Silvestro Micera of the Ecole Polytechnique Federale de Lausanne in Switzerland.

The wiring of his new bionic hand will be connected to the patient’s nervous system with the hope that the man will be able to control the movements of the hand as well as receiving touch signals from the hand’s skin sensors.

Dr Micera said that the hand will be attached directly to the patient’s nervous system via electrodes clipped onto two of the arm’s main nerves, the median and the ulnar nerves.

This should allow the man to control the hand by his thoughts, as well as receiving sensory signals to his brain from the hand’s sensors. It will effectively provide a fast, bidirectional flow of information between the man’s nervous system and the prosthetic hand.

“This is real progress, real hope for amputees. It will be the first prosthetic that will provide real-time sensory feedback for grasping,” Dr Micera said.

“It is clear that the more sensory feeling an amputee has, the more likely you will get full acceptance of that limb,” he told the American Association for the Advancement of Science meeting in Boston.

“We could be on the cusp of providing new and more effective clinical solutions to amputees in the next year,” he said.

An earlier, portable model of the hand was temporarily attached to Pierpaolo Petruzziello in 2009, who lost half his arm in a car accident. He was able to move the bionic hand’s fingers, clench them into a fist and hold objects. He said that he could feel the sensation of needles pricked into the hand’s palm.

However, this earlier version of the hand had only two sensory zones whereas the latest prototype will send sensory signals back from all the fingertips, as well as the palm and the wrists to give a near life-like feeling in the limb, Dr Micera said.

“The idea would be that it could deliver two or more sensations. You could have a pinch and receive information from three fingers, or feel movement in the hand and wrist,” Dr Micera said.

“We have refined the interface [connecting the hand to the patient], so we hope to see much more detailed movement and control of the hand,” he told the meeting.

The plan is for the patient to wear the bionic hand for a month to see how he adapts to the artificial limb. If all goes well, a full working model will be ready for testing within two years, Dr Micera said.

One of the unresolved issues is whether patients will be able to tolerate having such a limb attached to them all the time, or whether they would need to remove it periodically to give them a rest.

Another problem is how to conceal the wiring under the patient’s skin to make them less obtrusive. The electrodes of the prototype hand to be fitted later this year will be inserted through the skin rather than underneath it but there are plans under development to place the wiring subcutaneously, Dr Micera said.

http://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/gadgets-and-tech/news/a-sensational-breakthrough-the-first-bionic-hand-that-can-feel-8498622.html

Thanks to Kebmodee for bringing this to the attention of the It’s Interesting community.

Unemployed Austrian man cuts off foot to continue claiming jobless benefits – only to discover he is still eligible for work

On By A.P.In Amputation, Austria, Health, motivation, Stupidity, ViolenceLeave a comment

 

A man who almost died after cutting his own foot off so he could stay on jobless benefits has been told he might still qualify for work despite his amputation.

Long term unemployed Hans Url, 56, had just been told his hand-outs would stop if he did not accept work found for him by job centre staff.

And when his claims that he was too sick and did not like the work were challenged with the offer of a medical, he took drastic measures.

Url, of Mitterlabill, southern Austria, rigged up a mitre saw and sliced off his foot – then put it in the oven for good measure to ensure no surgeon could reattach it.

But job centre staff have delivered a blow to hapless Url’s plan by saying his new disability does not rule him out for work.

Police spokesman Franz Fasching said: ‘The planning was meticulous.

‘He waited until his wife and his adult son had left the house and he was alone.

‘He then switched it on and sliced off his left foot above the ankle – throwing it in the fire so it would not be possible to reattach it before he called emergency services.

‘He then made his way to the garage where he called emergency services and waited for them to arrive.

The police added that the man had almost died from loss of blood before the emergency services arrived and that they had recovered the foot from the oven – but that it had been too badly burned to reattach.

He was airlifted to hospital in Graz where his condition was said to be stable after emergency surgery to seal the wound.

A hospital spokesman said: ‘The foot was too badly burned to reattach. All we could do was seal the wound. He had lost a lot of blood – he almost died on the way to hospital. He was put in an artificial coma.’

The police spokesman Fasching added that they were investigating the case as an attempted suicide.

But Feldbach AMS job centre spokesman Hermann Gössinger said: ‘This is a tragic case but it will not help the man.

‘His latest excuse had been a bad back which is why he had been sent for a medical.

‘But even now losing a foot does not automatically mean he will not be able to work. He will be assessed once he is out of hospital and we will see what work we can find for him.’

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2121100/Man-saws-foot-avoid-work-continue-claiming-jobless-benefits.html#ixzz1qXMdOIKC