We’re excited to have our SpeedSpiral CMC Allograft Implant featured on NBC 10 WJAR! (aired on 9/16/19)
The segment featured Dr. Peter Weiss of University Orthopedics in RI. Weiss explains how this implant is revolutionizing thumb arthritis. You can view the segment as well as read the transcript here:
EAST PROVIDENCE, R.I. (WJAR) —
A new implant is getting the thumbs up from patients.
“The thumb is the third most common joint in the body to get arthritis,” said Dr. A. Peter Weiss, a hand surgeon at University Orthopedics. “You don’t think about it, but if you don’t have it, it’s really hard to do anything.”
His patient, Joanne Borden, of North Smithfield, gets it. Her left thumb was horribly arthritic.
“It was just painful to even open a water bottle, pick up a pan. I like to cook,” said Borden. “Even if something would hit my thumb, it was very painful.”
The problem was a bone at the base of her thumb.
“It’s kind of like the atlas for the thumb. The thumb’s sitting on it,” explained Weiss
The way to fix it is to remove the bone. Weiss said standard surgery utilizes a patient’s own tendons to replace that bone, and while it is great at eliminating the pain, he said the thumb isn’t always stable.
So, this hand surgeon came up with something new.
“It’s like a fire hose rolled up,” said Weiss. “It’s a thin piece of collagen. A long strip and we roll it up like a fire hose and it’s this hard-little implant. The body loves this. This is the scaffolding of what every tissue in your body is made out of — collagen.”
“The beauty of this is it’s hard in the beginning so people can have good power pinch,” said Weiss.
So far, Dr. Weiss has used this implant in about 15 patients, he says, with great success.
Weiss said other hand surgeons are getting on board.
“It speeds up the entire recovery process. My guess is it’s about 50 percent faster, the recovery in patients with this implant than without it,” said Weiss.
All Borden knows is the pain is gone and she has now got a grip.
“Now I can hit it. I can grip my steering wheel. I can do all the things that I want to do without thinking about,” said Borden. “I’m back to normal doing all the things that I can do.”
This is the 18th type of implant Dr. Weiss has designed over the years.
Others have included knuckle replacements for folks with rheumatoid arthritis.
This latest one was in conjunction with Massachusetts-based Arthosurface.
