Comparative Frames

March 22-23, 2013

Passing through airport security with a Taylor Spatial Frame in tow was a rather exciting development but, to be honest, it didn't compare to the general excitement associated with a return to Virginia. The trip spanned over a weekend. Arrive Friday, leave early Tuesday morning. Monday was supposedly a day at the University of Virginia; Saturday and Sunday were my days for myself. The bulk of the trip would be spent at a friend's house.

Given that the frame was tagging along, I really couldn't have stayed at a better place (this is ignoring all the other benefits of staying there for the weekend, namely that the family is really, really, really nice). Way back when, I mentioned that one of my friend's mother had broken her leg and subsequently worn a frame for months.

Yes, I stayed with that friend.

The moment I arrived, her mother stopped me and asked me to show off the frame. There were then immediate exclamations over how nice and non-medieval-torture-device my frame was. As it turns out, I seem to have had it good these past few months.

How? Well…

1) My frame is shiny and sleek.

Shiny and sleek on a relative scale, to be sure, but the thing does have a nifty black paint job and the triangular arrangement of the struts is rather aesthetically appealing. When I beheld the thing for the first time, I can remember being impressed with how good it looked. This was, of course, before the pins were added to the equation, at which point it looked less good.

After a few hours of talking comparative frames, I learned that not all frames are created equal visually. Some frames, you see, lack even a simple coat of black paint and are rather just unpainted metal, creating a look more along the lines of "medieval torture device" than "modern medical marvel which costs as much as a small car."

Also, a quick note here—whereas I have a bona fide Taylor Spatial Frame, my friend's mother had a normal external fixator (the struts on her device were fixed in position and could only extend vertically).

2) In the grand scheme of things, I don't have too many pins in my leg.

In all, I have seven pins in the leg: five half-pins (6 mm) and two piano wire pins. My friend's mother had ten pins, most of which were the piano wire varieties. The half-pins don't hurt at all, except for sometimes when I fiddle with the pins (I'm not supposed to do that). The piano wire pins, along with my hips and sometimes my knees, are among the parts of my body that hurt when aggravated. How aggravated, you might ask. Well…motion. More specifically, any motion involving the bending or straightening of the leg.

3) I have had zero infections (yet).

This one comes with a bit of an asterisk, as last doctor's appointment Dr. Sundberg ordered me to start ingesting antibiotic pills, which led a week and a half of me reveling in my ability to dry-swallow pills, much to the brothers' amazement. The redness around the pin sites went down, I was happy.

From what I understand, having an infection is not fun.

4) I can get water on my pins.

Technically speaking, the first few days of wearing this frame the device was not allowed to get wet. When you're as drugged out of your mind as I was for those first few days and as unable to use your lower body, let alone get out of bed, not getting the frame wet is not a big deal.

These days, however, my ability to get moisture on the frame is tremendously beneficial, mostly since I like being able to clean myself. Additionally, most of my pin care (I'll post tomorrow on pin care, so more on that later) takes place in the shower. The shower saves a ton of time.

Apparently, if you can't get water on the frame, showering is still possible. The frame just needs to be covered in a garbage bag.

5) I don't have to go into the hospital for pin care.

This is a big one. When my pins need help, I can either recruit my father to provide that help, which is pretty straightforward, depending on his travel schedule, or I can do it myself, which is sometimes easy, depending on how queasy I'm feeling. What I don't need are scheduled appointments. I don't need to be driven to the hospital (or clinic). It's a simple at-home deal, pins, washcloth, sometimes Q-tips.

6) My pin care does not involve hydrogen peroxide.

My single biggest fear heading into the procedure was that pin care would burn. My first round with pin care was just saline and Q-tips. It didn't hurt at all. The next few rounds were water and Q-tips. I was told that the burning sensation I'd read about came from hydrogen peroxide. Lacking in common sense, I more or less blindly assumed that pin care with hydrogen peroxide is a thing of the past.

Well…not so fast, it seems. From what I understand which, granted, is not much, the method of pin care you receive varies from brand of frame to brand of frame and doctor to doctor. With the Taylor Spatial Frame and Dr. Sundberg, my pin care has been pretty laid-back. However, for my friend's mother, it seems like not only did pin care involve having to go into the hospital (remember, she wasn't allowed to get the frame wet), but also utilized hydrogen peroxide.

In short, I'm feeling really lucky to have had the frame I had.

With that said, the circumstances between the two frames could not have been more different. Mine was a surgery planned months in advance, an eleven degree correction mapped out on the computer and implemented over the course of weeks. My friend's mother's was an emergency procedure after some form of incident involving a lawnmower and a hill which led to a shattered ankle. Hers was to hold bones in place while they healed from a traumatic break; mine was…well, also to hold bones in place, but more importantly to prevent future damage due to crooked legs.

But, and here's a big one, there are a lot of really basic similarities. You ready for another list?

1) Both frames are annoying, cumbersome devices.

I don't know the actual measurements of my frame or of hers, but suffice to say it is a big, annoying device with the approximate subtlety of a small log. Frames tend to crash into things such as walls, door frames, chairs, tables, cars, people, etc. Often, such a collision leads to a reaction of embarrassment tinged with regret, particularly if the object collided with can feel pain.

2) Both frames hurt.

My mantra throughout this entire process has been that the frame doesn't hurt, not really. At once, this is true and untrue. True, the frame does not hurt without provocation. Untrue, the frame doesn't hurt at all. My problem has been acknowledging that the piano wire pin emerging just beneath my leg is actually a part of the device rather than its own independent evil entity.

Here's the deal: yes, this thing hurts. The pin pulls on my skin when the joint moves, causing some measure of discomfort. In my case, it does not hurt enough for me to justify taking medicine to take care of the problem and, luckily, I only have the one aggravating pin site.

The other frame had a pin which went into the ankle. It was a piano wire pin. Just…imagine that.

Long story short: if you get a Taylor Spatial Frame or an external fixator, it will probably hurt. The degree of hurting, however, does vary and you could very well wind up with a comparatively peaceful frame (like I did).

3) Both frames interfered with walking and other such activity for a while.

This is, I think, equally self-explanatory. Part of this is the pain. Part of this is the geometric properties these devices possess. Part of this is getting over the realization that you're walking on bone which is very much broken. Part of this is trying to obey your doctor's orders to the best of your ability.

But once you get a frame place onto/into your leg, don't expect to walk right away. You won't have to relearn how to walk, probably, but there will be tentative first steps, an "I'm doing this right?" moment and an "I'm doing this right!" moment and times where you watch everybody else walking around and wish you could, too.

And, of course, a time where you can walk.

4) Going off some assumptions here, but in both cases the removal of the frame comes with tremendous relief.

At least, I've been assured that there will be relief. I can't wait. Less than two weeks and I'll be able to touch the back of my leg to the mattress of my bed again and maybe even to the grass outside and I'll be able to kneel (I haven't been able to kneel for months, isn't that odd?) and…

And, to some extent, I'll be free.