Video Transcript – AmputeeOT: How a test prosthetic socket is made.
Video Transcript
Hi guys, this is Christina, the Amputee OT. In this video, I am going to show you how a prosthetic test socket is made. This is Standard Artificial Limbs. They’ve actually been in business here in St. Louis for about a hundred years, which is pretty cool for me– because that means they have a lot of really fun stuff for me to play with. And they also have a bunch of new shiny technology.
Okay, to get your prosthetic check socket made, first you have to take off your original one. Then you have to have your prosthetist wrap your leg in cellophane. After that he will put a sock on your leg; and the reason for that is because he’s going to take a pencil and mark all of the bony prominences in your leg –such as your fibular head, and your tibia, and your patella tendon, and all of your bones, and any spots that he needs to relieve pressure on. After that, he’s going to wrap your leg in a couple of layers of a plaster cast. And it’s sort of an elastic plaster cast, and it gets a little bit warm when he’s applying it; and pretty soon after he applies it, it gets all nice and solid. And here he is rubbing all of the plaster in. And then he’s going to pull the plaster cast off of your leg. Like…. …this!
After the cast is made, that will be a negative of your residual limb, and so the prosthetic technician has to make a positive of your residual limb. So he takes the cast that was just made and he fills it with plaster, and he sticks this rod in there, and he uses it to get all the bubbles out. And he pulls it up a little bit so that it’s not stuck right on the bottom; and pretty soon, it is solid. Takes about five minutes. Once the plaster cast hardens, the prosthetic technician has to cut the original negative plaster cast off of the positive; and this is pretty cool; because you can see where all of the blue pencil marks that were made got transferred to the positive mold of your residual limb! After that, the positive mold has to be sanded down, because there are certain areas that need less volume and certain other areas that need more; and so this is where the extra piece of the prosthetist comes in as he sands smooth the mold; then he sands down even more to make it super smooth.
And what he’s doing here is removing all of the imperfections so that once the check socket is laid up, it also doesn’t have any imperfections– because pretty much anything imperfect here will get transferred to the check socket. Here the prosthetic technician is getting the plastic ready, because this plastic for the check socket is going to go into the oven. Here’s what I think is the most fun part to watch. The plastic has gotten all soft, and so the prosthetic technician is going to put the plastic and over the positive mold, and then pat it down and turn on a vacuum which will suck all of the air out of the socket; and basically suck the plastic right to the mold! After this, all you have to do is add the appropriate components, screw your foot on, and there you go you have a test socket! Cool, huh?
Okay guys, that’s all for now. I hope you enjoyed this video. If you have any questions, you can leave them in the comment section below. You can subscribe if you like– I put out new videos every Wednesday! And…See you later! Bye!