Bionic Bones

Reported December 2010

LOVELADY, TX (Ivanhoe Newswire) -- By the time the year’s over, hundreds of kids will be diagnosed with bone cancer. Not only will they spend their childhood facing treatment and surgeries, but also many will deal with invasive surgeries for their entire life. Now, a new technique is changing the game faster than anything available in decades.

Morgan Larue knows her nine-ball, and she’s quick on the sticks in foosball, video games and sports too, just ask her.

"Basketball, gymnastics, that’s pretty much it!" Morgan Larue told Ivanhoe.

So when her family found out Morgan had bone cancer, it was devastating.

"We thought we maybe had a minor knee injury and came out a few hours later learning that she very probably had a tumor in her leg," Ashley Larue, Morgan's mother, said.

The femur in Morgan's left leg was attacked by osteosarcoma. It accounts for just three-percent of all childhood cancers, affecting 400 kids per year. Simply replacing the bone would’ve meant invasive surgery every time she had a growth spurt.

"There are very few good options for someone that’s still growing," Rex Marco, M.D., an orthopedic surgeon at Texas Children’s Hospital at the University of Texas, explained.

Oncologic orthopedic surgeons, who specialize in treating bone cancers at the Texas Children’s Cancer Center in Houston, inserted an extendable bone implant. It allows doctors to extend Morgan's leg up to three inches by remote control.

"It consists of basically a magnet," Lisa Wong, M.D., said.

It's a circular magnet called a "donut". Putting Morgan's leg through it extends the implant one millimeter in just four minutes.

"There’s no pain, there’s no incision, there’s no antibiotics, and there’s no risk of infection," Dr. Marco said.

And it spares Morgan up to ten future surgeries on that femur, which sounds good. Her family agrees.

"It’s almost one of those things that sounds too good to be true, " Ashley Larue said.

But it is true, this unbeatable girl, and her bionic bone. Morgan was just the 15th person in the U.S. so far to undergo this type of surgery. Her family raised 40 thousand dollars for medical expenses by holding a spaghetti dinner in her honor. Just days later, the FDA granted Morgan an exemption, allowing the surgery to take place.

The American Physical Society contributed to the information contained in the TV portion of this report.

Click here to Go Inside This Science or contact:

Rex Marco, MD
Orthopedics
Texas Children’s Hospital,
University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston
(713) 838-8300

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