"Sport Specific" Orthoses Designs

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With the increase in www information and promotion by many labs out there I have noticed a significant increase in the 'knowledge' of some of my first time patients.

One of the changes I am seeing is the request for "sport specific" designs they have seen on the net.

I hate these PR designs as my designs are "patient specific".

Any opinions?

 

Yeh. Will show soon (PFOLA 2007) how variations in orthotic design effect the orthoses "performance" under loading.

 

Dave

As you know, but for the benfit of others, I work for an orthoses manufacturer.
I have simlar issues re the PR of orthoses labs as I get tainted by the perception that we are all unscrupulous.

My question is where does the culpability for orthoses design finish - the lab telling you that their casting system = the best FFO in the world that can cure hiccups or the practitioner for believing it?

Re the sport specific design, I have produced such a design to hopefully push people into thinking that sports foot mechanics may differ from walking mechanics and consequently the orthoses may have to be different.
Is this my responsibility as an FFO manufacturer or should the clinician be capable of making the right descision?
Ideal world verse reality?

Cheers

Phil

 

Looking forward to your presentation Simon. Im all booked and ready for San Diego.

 

Dare say we'll split the atom over some cold ones. Heard Kirby's bringing his cyclotron.

 

Hi Phil

As you well know 99% pf people on here are like minded and are top notch practioners and/or good suppliers. My sig rant is based on the 90% of clinicians/suppliers in the real world that are just there to push product through the medium of PR and/or so-called ''top class'' orthotic therapy and would never in a million years have anything to contribute to Pod-Arena.

Is this an indication of lack of approp education on your customers behalf that they don't have the right knowledge base to correctly prescribe - thus indicating a lack of willing on their behalf not to want to learn. Or is this an indication of an acceptance by the profession that it is a lab's job to provide this service. In either case it shows a lack of willing on the clinicians part to change and maybe a lab should aim to get the clinician to learn to be a better prescriber. I wonder your opinion on this?

 

It will be good to catch up and Kirby was in good form in Belgium so Im sure cold ones will be the order of the day (esp as Dickinson is coming as well )

 

Dave

My experience is that due to the 'potentially' complex nature of orthoses prescribing - made worse in the UK by one specific lab (Better not mention them or I WILL get in trouble) - practitioners have little time to learn about how orthoses are put together and lack the confidence to think outside the box.
The best prescribers in my experience are those that have access to there own facilities and adjust there orthoses as needed and are prepared to question how they work. Then they invariably keep it simple. (We have a lot of success producing 'carve only' devices to customers who want to tweak there orthoses prior to manufacture and keep the prices down without the hasle of a full lab to manufacture devices from scratch)
I believe that the role of the lab is to facilitate orthoses design - the practitioner states what they want the device to do and the restrictions of footwear etc WITH the posting values - the lab can then help with materials, designs etc.I have exactly the same issues as you and I will NEVER prescribe an orthoses for anyone!!

Re improving the practitioner, I have seen people come on in leaps and bounds when they have made the time to discuss the device prior to us making it. (Very time consuming work and a role that not all manufacturers will support)

My own ambition is to have our lab delivering on both a clinical and customers services level .ie. good devices, fair price, good accounting proceedures (!!!) and the right attitude!
(I am also confident of finding the loch ness monster and the holy grail).

Bit of a rant - sorry.

Cheers

Phil

 

In fact, I'll be over in England with Eric Fuller in a few weeks for Biomechanics Summer School 2007 to sample some good British brews. I wonder if either of the Simons will be there??

PFOLA will be interesting. This will be the first year that Paul Scherer has not organized the meeting. It looks much more research-oriented than before which may be good for the researchers. However, it will be interesting to see how the majority of clinicians view the meeting with less clinical emphasis.

 

it will be very interesting to see some of these new sports specific orthoses designs. please post some links or post biomechanics summer summer school updates.

thanks