[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]PLYMOUTH, Michigan – Sept. 7, 2017 – Materialise has expanded its 3D printed orthopaedic solutions to include osteotomy guides for adults in the United States with metacarpal/phalange and clavicle bone deformities. These guides, developed in collaboration with surgical teams, are designed specifically for each individual patient to help orthopaedic surgeons understand and execute even the most complex cases with confidence.
Orthopaedic surgeons trust Materialise’s clinical engineers and their proven solutions to provide support with 3D planning and patient-specific surgical guides in bone deformity corrections. Materialise has supported surgeons in more than 1,000 adult clinical osteotomy consultations, and with the addition of metacarpal/phalange and clavicle guides, more adults will be eligible to benefit from the 3D printing technology.[/vc_column_text][vc_single_image image=”1713″ img_size=”full”][vc_column_text]
“It’s exciting to see Materialise’s patient-specific technology expand to allow surgeons to correct more complex bone deformities and enable more patients to assume the quality of life they had before their injury”
– Bryan Crutchfield, Vice President and General Manager Materialise North America.
Materialise 3D printed guides can be used in most operations, from standard procedures to highly complex cases. Because each guide is patient-specific, they can give orthopaedic surgeons increased confidence in the operating room, and have in some cases, been used to perform first of their kind corrections.
These new guides will expand surgeons’ access to 3D printing technology that has been used in the past to correct complex bone deformities in other areas of the body. In one case in Texas, a young man’s elbow reconstruction was delayed for several years, making the procedure to repair extremely complex. He had lost all feeling and function in his left arm due to major nerve damage, yet all the bones remained intact. In his right arm, his elbow had been completely shattered. Although it had never been done, surgeons began looking into taking his uninjured elbow from his left arm and transplanting it into his right arm. This is where Materialise Clinical Engineering, played a key part in helping surgeons visualize the patient’s pre-operative anatomy and strategize the correction. What made this case particularly unique was the fact that surgeons had to transplant anatomy that was a mirror image of another side of the body.
Working in coordination with the surgical team, Materialise assisted in reconstructing the elbow virtually to assess potential risks and develop a surgical plan. A successful elbow transplant, in combination with affixing the surrounding soft and joining tissues, made this a first of its kind surgery, marking a milestone in the orthopaedic industry.
Pioneering procedures such as this elbow transplant, drives Materialise to continue innovating and strengthening the company’s mission of developing products that result in a better and healthier world, while gaining a more in-depth knowledge of additive manufacturing to provide more adults with the chance to live a normal life.
To learn more about 3D printed osteotomy guides, contact Materialise for a free 3D Analysis or stop by booth #209 at the American Society for Surgery of the Hand Annual Meeting on September 7-9, 2017 in San Francisco to speak with Materialise clinical engineers.
About Materialise
Materialise incorporates more than 25 years of 3D printing experience into a range of software solutions and 3D printing services, which together form the backbone of the 3D printing industry. Materialise’s open and flexible solutions enable players in a wide variety of industries, including healthcare, automotive, aerospace, art and design, and consumer goods, to build innovative 3D printing applications that aim to make the world a better and healthier place. Headquartered in Belgium, with branches worldwide, Materialise combines the largest group of software developers in the industry with one of the largest 3D printing facilities in the world. For additional information, please visit: www.materialise.com.
About Materialise’s Medical Division
Materialise Medical, which has pioneered many of the leading medical applications of 3D printing, enables researchers, engineers and clinicians to revolutionize innovative patient-specific treatment. Materialise Medical’s open and flexible platform of software and services, Materialise Mimics, forms the foundation of certified Medical 3D Printing, in clinical as well as research environments, offering virtual planning software tools, 3D-printed anatomical models, and patient-specific surgical guides and implants. For additional information, please visit:http://www.materialise.com/en/medical.
Cautionary Statement on Forward-Looking Statements
Some of the statements in this press release are “forward-looking” and are made pursuant to the safe harbor provision of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. These forward-looking statements include statements relating to, among other things, our planned commercialization efforts and regulatory approvals of our technologies as well as the success thereof and our research and development projects. These forward-looking statements are based upon the expectations of management under current assumptions at the time of this press release. We caution you that forward-looking statements are not guarantees of future performance and involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors that are in some cases beyond our control that may cause our actual results to differ materially from our expectations. We are providing this information as of the date of this press release and do not undertake any obligation to update any forward-looking statements contained in this presentation as a result of new information, future events or otherwise, unless we have obligations under the federal securities laws to update and disclose material developments related to previously disclosed information.
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