BEIJING – A 12-year-old cancer patient in China underwent a first-of-its-kind operation to implant a 3D-printed vertebra into his spine, Reuters reported. During the 5-hour procedure, surgeons at Peking University Hospital in Beijing removed a tumor from Qin Minglin’s spine before implanting the 3D-printed vertebra. The novel device was made from titanium powder and included a series of tiny pores which will allow the bone to grow and bond to the structure as it heals. Currently, the standard procedure for this kind of operation involves removing the bone and inserting a titanium tube held in place by screws and surgical cement. However, the tube can become detached over time. For this novel procedure, doctors used a combination of scans and specialized engineering software to create a perfect replica of the piece of the patient’s spine that needed to be replaced. foxnews/health/2014/08/28/first-ever-3d-printed-vertebra-implanted-in-12-year-old-cancer-patients-spine/?intcmp=obnetwork
Posted on: Fri, 29 Aug 2014 18:35:18 +0000
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