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Man Refuses to Give Up, Builds Own Prosthetic Arm

by Terrence O'Brien on February 13, 2009 at 12:30 PM

Man Refuses to Give Up, Builds Own Prosthetic Arm
Now just to be clear, we're not suggesting you ignore your doctor's advice, but we've got to admire Mark Lesek who refused to accept that he was unsuitable to receive a prosthetic arm.

Lesek lost his arm in a car accident five years ago but was told the amputation was too high for him to receive a usable prosthetic. He decided to ignore his Australian doctors and went to a different doctor who specially ordered an $80,000 prosthetic from Germany. However that arm broke down and proved to be unusable. To make matters worse, it cost $6,000 to send back to Germany for repairs.

Then he heard about osseointegration, a medical field involving implanting metal into bone. The doctors in Melbourne, Australia refused to perform the procedure, so Lesek flew to Sweden and went to the Branemark Osseointegration Centre where he was fitted with an $80,000 bolt that acts as a sort of artificial shoulder.



Unable to find an affordable and suitable prosthetic arm, Lesek took matters into his own hands and crafted an arm with the help of a friend at his welding and engineering business. He has also enlisted the help of a team at the University of Tasmania to develop a more agile computer-controlled arm.

This just goes to show that you're parents were right -- you can do anything you want. Though, it helps if you have your own engineering lab at your disposal. [From: The Mercury]

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Tags: medical, medicine, prosthetic, prosthetics, top

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