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Design of a Functional Splint for Rehabilitation of Achilles Tendon Injury Using Advanced Manufacturing (AM) Techniques. Implementation Study

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Abstract

The use of conventional immobilization splints can cause a lot of mishaps and discomfort in patients. In addition, it is common the generation of muscle, joint and vascular complications arising from the application of classic restraint devices in this phase of treatment. Currently, it is being observed that these problems could be solved with the use of Advanced Manufacturing techniques based on Additive Manufacturing (AM), industrial digitalization and reverse engineering for the realization of individualized immobilization splints. The present study proposes to give these splints a functional character in their design adapting them to a specific pathology, in this case to the partial rupture of Achilles tendon. It also provides a comparison against the use of conventional plaster splints as an improvement factor for their definitive implementation considering the initial sanitary use for which they were designed. In this way, there have been created therapeutic windows that allow the application of rehabilitation techniques, being the treatment that would be carried out developed in parallel. The designed splint has been made in FilaFlex and Polycarbonate, materials that guarantee comfort and resistance at the same time. In addition, an optimization in terms of material has been executed, lightening the splint and reducing environmental impact and manufacturing costs. As a result of this preliminary study, a prototype on scale printed in PLA has been generated.

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Acknowledgments

The authors gratefully acknowledge the company Trimédica S.L. (http://www.trimedica.es/) and the manufacturer of electromedical devices fisioline (http://www.fisioline.com/es/home-medical-es.html) for their assignment of all the required electromedical equipment in the present research work.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Technical University of Madrid, 28012, Madrid, Spain

    Fernando Blaya, Pilar San Pedro, Julia Lopez-Silva & Roberto D’Amato

  2. European University of Madrid, Madrid, Spain

    Alonso Blaya San Pedro

  3. VisualMed Systems Group, Universidad de Salamanca, Salamanca, Spain

    Juan A. Juanes

Authors
  1. Fernando Blaya
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  2. Pilar San Pedro
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  3. Alonso Blaya San Pedro
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  4. Julia Lopez-Silva
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  5. Juan A. Juanes
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  6. Roberto D’Amato
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Roberto D’Amato.

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Conflict of interest

Fernando Blaya Haro declares that he has no conflict of interest. Pilar San Pedro declares that he has no conflict of interest. Alonso Blaya San Pedro declares that he has no conflict of interest. Julia Lopez-Silva declares that he has no conflict of interest. Juan A. Juanes declares that he has no conflict of interest. Roberto D’Amato declares that he has no conflict of interest. Manuel Islán declares that he has no conflict of interest.

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This article does not contain any studies with human participants performed by any of the authors. This article does not contain any studies with animals performed by any of the authors.

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Blaya, F., Pedro, P.S., Pedro, A.B.S. et al. Design of a Functional Splint for Rehabilitation of Achilles Tendon Injury Using Advanced Manufacturing (AM) Techniques. Implementation Study. J Med Syst 43, 122 (2019). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10916-019-1247-z

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