Shriner's Hospital

Today we spent most of the day at Shriner's hospital with Lexi doing the work up for her upcoming leg surgery and participating in a gait study her Doctor is doing to help get more documentation on how beneficial this new surgical method is for correcting kids legs. It truly has been a miracle that Lexi has become a patient of Dr. Peter Stevens. His methods have been less invasive and have relieved Lexi's pain. When Lexi was about 5 years old her feet turned in when she was walking, it was about that same time she started having pain in her feet after walking for long periods of time. I brought it up to my pediatrician Dr. Robert Terishima. He was my pediatrician as a kid and was so knowledgeable when it came to kids issues. He explained to me that while Lexi was in utero her femur bones grew twisted into her hip bones and the pain she was having in her feet were caused by very flexible tendons and therefore the bones in her feet were not being supported when she walked. He referred us to Dr Stevens at Primary Children's Hospital. My pediatrician had known and worked with Dr Stevens for a long time. Dr Stevens is one of the leading  pediatric orthopedic doctors in the nation. Lexi started seeing. Dr. Stevens when she was 6 and he immediately started her with orthotics in her shoes, that worked for awhile but in June 2010 she had her first surgery to correct her feet. Lexi would become the second patient in the USA to undergo this surgery. She participated in a gait study at that time so that other doctors and insurance companies could see the effectiveness of this new procedure. She had her surgery at Shriners because our insurance wouldn't cover it due to the fact it was an unproven method. Dr Stevens put two metal bolts in the arches of her feet to provide support until the tendons could tighten. Lexi had a walking cast on each foot for the next 6 weeks. In the past kids who needed this kind of surgery would have bone removed from their hip and grafted into their foot, they would then spend 10 weeks in a no walking cast. Lexi was no longer in pain once the casts were removed. In March of 2013 Lexi had the first surgery on her legs to straighten her femur bone. The procedure was very invasive. Her right femur bone was broken, rotated out and then held in place with a metal rod threaded down the inside of her bone. Then she had metal plates placed in the growth plates of each knee to hold them from growing. Lexi spent several months in a wheelchair and crutches.
Now to today, we are preparing to fix her left leg. They do several things during a gait study. They connect electrodes all up and down her legs and on her feet. They then use special cameras to map the way she walks, runs and jumps. That information is then uploaded into the computer and helps determine how to align Lexi's leg. They then have her jump off boxes and climb stairs to get all the info they need not only for Lexi but to show the medical community the long term effectiveness of this procedure. 
I can't help but be so grateful to live to close to two amazing children's hospitals so that my daughter can have all her medical needs met.

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