Congenital anomalies, including limb deficiency, affect approximately 7.9 million newborns annually. Fitting the prosthesis at an early stage will aid the patient to achieve two-legged standing, to develop reciprocating gait and to attain an optimal body image. A 64-year-old female diagnosed with congenital limb deficiency, right, using a customized shoe was admitted for prosthetic management at the study hospital. Patient underwent inpatient prosthetic training with physical and occupational therapy. Psychological evaluation was done to assess for depression and anxiety and to determine the patient's response to the prosthesis. The Prosthesis Evaluation Questionnaire (PEQ), an instrument to measure prosthesis-related quality of life and functional outcome, was administered. 3D motion analysis was done to observe the temporospatial parameters of the patient's gait with and without the prosthesis. The patient had generally positive response towards her prosthesis based on PEQ administered 1 month after the provision of prosthesis. Psychological evaluation showed that the patient had improved general outlook after the provision of the prosthesis. Patient had slower self-selected walking speed compared to transtibial amputee using prosthesis. Early fitting and fabrication of prosthesis is recommended for the patient with congenital amputation. Studies showed that delayed fitting of prosthesis may decrease acceptance and use of prosthesis. However, provision of properly fitted prosthesis may still improve the quality of life of the patient who is already functionally independent without it. More than increase in physical activity, participation in leisurely activities that promote social interaction motivates elderly patients to use their prosthesis more often.
Lower Extremity ; Prosthesis Fitting

Based on the investigation and analysis of the current situation for hearing aid fitting, some analysis results and suggestions for the development of the industry are presented, including manufacturer, association for medical devices industry and supervision division.
Health Care Sector ; Hearing Aids ; Prosthesis Fitting ; methods

At present, foreign standard knee joint prosthesis is mostly used in clinical practice; it can well represent the biological characteristic of knee joint on human being. So this paper adopts the reverse engineering technology in that connexion, presents novel positioning method of acquiring the point data on the surface of knee joint prosthesis, puts forward the algorithm of three-point angle method for removing the noise error and correcting the noise error based on the least squares plane to smooth point cloud. And then, the surface of knee joint prosthesis with better accuracy and smoothness can be generated. Finally, the knee joint prosthesis model can be generated. Thus, a basis is provided for the localization of knee joint prosthesis. This new algorithm is mainly used for the surface modeling based on point cloud smoothing, including the surface of knee joint prosthesis, the surface of regular shape, and the surface with gentle change in curvature.
Computer-Aided Design ; Humans ; Knee Joint ; anatomy & histology ; surgery ; Knee Prosthesis ; Prosthesis Design ; methods ; Prosthesis Fitting ; methods

PURPOSE: With its increasing popularity, several complications, such as infection, exposure, and extrusion have been reported in the use of the porous orbital implants. Exposure of the implants is one of the most difficult complications to treat. We evaluate the effect of treatment in exposed porous orbital implants with various techniques. METHODS: From January 1995 to December 2000, 15 patients visited our clinic with exposure of implant after porous orbital implantation. The following procedures were used to cover the implants: observation with delayed prosthesis fitting and posterior vaulting of the prosthesis, burring away the anterior surface of the hydroxyapatite implant and placing dermis fat graft, removing infected implants and dermis fat graft, and removal and 180degrees rotation and replacement of porous implants according to the degree of exposure. RESULTS: Porous implants exposures occurred 1 to 12 weeks after implantations (mean, 5.2 weeks). Small areas of exposure (<3mm) closed spontaneously (2 cases), remained stationary (2 cases), and increased the exposure area requiring dermis fat graft (1 case). During the follow-up period (mean, 19 months), no porous orbital implant was exposed again except 1 case who received previous orbital irradiation therapy. CONCLUSIONS: Small exposure of porous orbital implants less than 3 mm in diameter may be closed with nonsurgical methods. In the case of exposure larger than 4 mm, dermis fat graft or removal and 180degrees rotation and replacement of porous implants were effective in the treatment of exposure.
Dermis ; Durapatite ; Follow-Up Studies ; Humans ; Orbit* ; Orbital Implants* ; Prostheses and Implants ; Prosthesis Fitting ; Transplants

PURPOSE: Adequate passive-fitting of one-piece cast 3-element implant-supported frameworks is hard to achieve. This short communication aims to present an alternative method for section of one-piece cast frameworks and for casting implant-supported frameworks. MATERIALS AND METHODS: Three-unit implant-supported nickel-chromium (Ni-Cr) frameworks were tested for vertical misfit (n = 6). The frameworks were cast as one-piece (Group A) and later transversally sectioned through a diagonal axis (Group B) and compared to frameworks that were cast diagonally separated (Group C). All separated frameworks were laser welded. Only one side of the frameworks was screwed. RESULTS: The results on the tightened side were significantly lower in Group C (6.43 +/- 3.24 microm) when compared to Groups A (16.50 +/- 7.55 microm) and B (16.27 +/- 1.71 microm) (P<.05). On the opposite side, the diagonal section of the one-piece castings for laser welding showed significant improvement in the levels of misfit of the frameworks (Group A, 58.66+/-14.30 microm; Group B, 39.48+/-12.03 microm; Group C, 23.13+/-8.24 microm) (P<.05). CONCLUSION: Casting diagonally sectioned frameworks lowers the misfit levels. Lower misfit levels for the frameworks can be achieved by diagonally sectioning one-piece frameworks.
Axis, Cervical Vertebra ; Dental Implants ; Dental Prosthesis, Implant-Supported ; Dental Soldering ; Denture, Partial, Fixed ; Prostheses and Implants ; Prosthesis Fitting ; Prosthodontics ; Welding

OBJECTIVES: The stimulation levels programmed in cochlear implant systems are affected by an evolution since the first switch-on of the processor. This study was designed to evaluate the changes in stimulation levels over time and the relationship between post-implantation physiological changes and with the hearing experience provided by the continuous use of the cochlear implant. METHODS: Sixty-two patients, ranging in age from 4 to 68 years at the moment of implantation participated in this study. All subjects were implanted with the 12 channels COMBI 40+ cochlear implant at San Cecilio University Hospital, Granada, Spain. Hearing loss etiology and progression characteristics varied across subjects. RESULTS: The analyzed programming maps show that the stimulation levels suffer a fast evolution during the first weeks after the first switch-on of the processor. Then, the evolution becomes slower and the programming parameters tend to be stable at about 6 months after the first switch-on. The evolution of the stimulation levels implies an increment of the electrical dynamic range, which is increased from 15.4 to 20.7 dB and improves the intensity resolution. A significant increment of the sensitivity to acoustic stimuli is also observed. For some patients, we have also observed transitory changes in the electrode impedances associated to secretory otitis media, which cause important changes in the programming maps. CONCLUSION: We have studied the long-term evolution of the stimulation levels in cochlear implant patients. Our results show the importance of systematic measurements of the electrode impedances before the revision of the programming map. This report also highlights that the evolution of the programming maps is an important factor to be considered in order to determine an adequate calendar fitting of the cochlear implant processor.
Acoustics ; Cochlear Implants ; Electric Impedance ; Electric Stimulation ; Electrodes ; Hearing ; Hearing Loss ; Humans ; Otitis Media with Effusion ; Prosthesis Fitting ; Spain

The loss of an upper limb significantly limits the functional activities of daily living. A huge emphasis is placed on the manipulation, shape, weight, and comfort of a prosthesis, to enable its use as an inherent body part. Even with technological advances, customized upper-extremity myoelectric prosthesis remain heavy and expensive. The high cost of upper-extremity prosthesis is an especially steep economic barrier for patients. Three-dimensional (3D) printing is a promising avenue for reducing the cost of prosthesis. We applied 3D-printed pressure-sensored prosthetics to a traumatic transradial amputee, and compared the hand functions with a customized myoelectric prosthesis. The 3D-printed pressure-sensored prosthetics showed low grip strength and decreased dexterity compared to the conventional myoelectric prosthesis. Although there were a few limitations, the fabrication of prosthesis with 3D printing technology can overcome previous problems such as high production cost, long fabrication period and heavy weight.
Activities of Daily Living ; Amputation ; Amputees ; Hand Strength ; Hand* ; Humans ; Printing, Three-Dimensional ; Prostheses and Implants ; Prosthesis Fitting ; Upper Extremity

The paper introduced the structure of digital hearing aid in brief firstly, then analyzed and compared signal processing algorithms applied in digital hearing aid, serving respectively in multi-channel frequency compensation, noise reduction and acoustic feedback cancellation. Finally, several special signal processing techniques used in digital hearing aid were introduced.
Algorithms ; Analog-Digital Conversion ; Hearing Aids ; Humans ; Prosthesis Fitting ; Signal Processing, Computer-Assisted ; instrumentation ; Speech Discrimination Tests

In order to reduce the test time in real ear hearing-aid fitting for children, the validity of applying the average real ear to coupler differences (RECDs) in prefitting procedure using a 2cc coupler measurement system was evaluated by checking whether the majority of people's RECDs might occur within 5 dB of the average RECDs (N = 116) in each test frequency and age group. The percentages of occurrence were around 90% in test subjects' RECDs in saturation sound pressure levels (SSPLs) and around 70% in gain in each important test frequency. Appropriate test frequencies in prefitting are 500, 1000, 1500 and 2000 Hz.
Adolescence ; Adult ; Aged ; Child ; Child, Preschool ; Ear ; Hearing Aids* ; Human ; Infant ; Middle Age ; Otolaryngology/methods* ; Otolaryngology/instrumentation* ; Prosthesis Fitting/methods* ; Time Factors

OBJECTIVETo compare the influence of different investment materials, methods and crown height on the cast shrinkage of full crowns made of dental base metal alloy.

METHODSAll of the 288 wax patterns were made and divided into three groups according to their crown height. In every group, wax patterns were invested in metal rings and paper rings with three types investment material and cast with base metal alloys. Then the inside diameters of castings were measured and analyzed by statistical package SPSS.

RESULTSDifferences between groups invested with the three types of material were significant(P < 0.01). There were significant difference between the groups investing with metal rings and paper rings(P < 0.01).

CONCLUSIONThe component of investment material and invested ring can affect the cast shrinkage of dental base metal alloy apparently.

Crowns ; standards ; Dental Alloys ; standards ; Dental Casting Investment ; Dental Casting Technique ; instrumentation ; Humans ; Inlay Casting Wax ; chemistry ; classification ; Materials Testing ; instrumentation ; methods ; Metal Ceramic Alloys ; standards ; Prosthesis Fitting