Friday, June 25, 2010

Oscar Gets New Feet

This just in, from Round-The-Way-Gay, and ISBL correspondent, Neal:


A cat named Oscar, whose back feet were severed by a combine harvester--I know........YEEOW!--has been given two prosthetic limbs in a pioneering operation by Noel Fitzpatrick, a British veterinarian. The new feet are custom-made implants that "peg" the ankle to the foot, and are bioengineered to mimic the way deer antler bone grows through the skin.
Oscar was referred to Fitzpatrick by his local vet in Jersey, following the accident last October when Oscar was struck by the combine harvester whilst dozing in the sun.
The prosthetic pegs, called intraosseous transcutaneous amputation prosthetics [ITAPS] were developed by a team from University College London led by Professor Gordon Blunn and his team, who worked in partnership with Fitzpatrick to develop these weight-bearing implants.

Mr Fitzpatrick explained: "The real revolution with Oscar is [that] we have put a piece of metal and a flange into which skin grows into an extremely tight bone...[and]...We have managed to get the bone and skin to grow into the implant and we have developed an 'exoprosthesis' that allows this implant to work as a see-saw on the bottom of an animal's limbs to give him effectively normal gait."
You go Oscar!
And watch him go!
But stay away from naps in the fields and combines.

5 comments:

  1. Saw the picture on-line, but had not watched the video. I will repost in a week or two.

    The video brought tears to my eyes :o)

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  2. That was amazing.

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  3. It really is just amazing what can be done these days I tell ya!

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  4. Beautiful Bob. I read about Oscar, but didn't know there was video of his recovery and "first" steps.

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  5. I miss Jaime sommers!

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