Last weeks ten leg prostheses were made by our 3D team. In the middle of the group picture, you see a selection of the people who received a prosthesis. Joshep is able to work behind his loom again. The prosthesis helps him well since he needs two legs to practice the technique. He does not need crutches anymore while walking, this makes that he can also chop wood in the jungle again.
All people that received a prosthesis will be closely monitored during follow-up. If the follow-up goes well, we will set up a continuous production process next year. Our first goal is to be able to offer a prosthesis to all patients that undergo an amputation in Masanga hospital.
In the last picture, I say goodbye to Idrissah and Osman. They have worked very hard in the last weeks by taking care of the rehabilitation of patients and manufacturing prostheses. The baton is handed over to Pien de Graaf, Technical Medicine student at the University of Twente. She will continue the project in the upcoming months by performing research on producing low-cost 3D-printed arm prostheses. From the 3D Lab Radboudumc in Nijmegen, I continue the preparatory work for the next trip together with the stagiaires from University of Twente, TU Delft and Hogeschool van Arnhem en Nijmegen that are collaborating in the project. Last weeks were a great success. The 3D lab in Masanga Hospital Sierra Leone is up and running again!!