Finding a Prosthetic that Works: Shriners Hospital for Children

I received my first prosthetic leg in April 2012 from a clinic near Stanford. It had been almost six months since my surgery. The process of getting the leg took about a month. Because I was growing so fast, I needed frequent adjustments to my prosthetic leg. The clinic near Stanford did a great job, but it was a two-hour drive, and it soon became clear that we needed to find someone closer to Monterey where we lived. That search wasn’t easy. Rotationplasty is rare, and the local prosthetist I started working with hadn’t seen a case like mine before. Still, he was willing to learn and worked hard to help me.

When my family moved to Pullman, Washington in the fall of 2014, I started going to a new prosthetist. Like before, he hadn’t worked with rotationplasty, but he did the best he could. Because of the challenges working with different prosthetists, there were moments when my parents wondered if rotationplasty had been the right choice, but they knew it had given me the greatest potential for mobility.

Things really turned around in 2015 when Shriners Hospital for Children in Spokane brought on a new prosthetist from Salt Lake City who had experience with rotationplasty. He understood what I needed and was able to make a much better leg. It made a huge difference—not just in how the leg fit, but in how confident I felt using it.

Since then, I’ve been able to stay active and participate in a lot of sports. It has made me really appreciate how lucky we were to have a Shriners hospital nearby. Not all Shriners locations offer orthopedic care, and most are in big cities, so having one right in Spokane was an unexpected gift.

Shriners Hospitals for Children is a nonprofit healthcare system that specializes in orthopedic care, spinal cord injuries, burns, and cleft conditions. They bill insurance but don’t charge families anything out of pocket, which was a big help to us. Prosthetics are expensive and specialized, and having access to a team that understood my needs made all the difference. Over the years, Shriners has continued making my prosthetic legs, and I feel incredibly fortunate to have had their support.

I have been fortunate to receive a high-quality prosthetic at little to no cost. But not every amputee is in the same situation. Fortunately, there are some great organizations working to expand access and help more amputees receive the prosthetic care they need. I’ll be able to keep receiving care and prosthetics from Shriners until I turn 21. After that, I’ll need to look into other options, but I’m thankful to have some time and a strong foundation to build on.