Growing Rods for Scoliosis

Children with severe scoliosis often spend their entire childhood going through a series of painful surgeries to correct the curve in their spine, but all of those surgeries are no longer necessary thanks to breakthrough technology.

Twelve year old Brooke Olson may be small for her age, but karate has taught her to stand tall and proud. You’d never guess that just a few months earlier, Brooke had a hard time standing at all.

Inside Brooke’s back are two titanium growing rods, surgically implanted to correct the curve in her spine that worsened to 60 degrees last year.

Source : KSAT 12 , 17th Sep 2015 

Brooke’s mother, Lynise Olson, told Ivanhoe, “Her back was in pain pretty much all the time at that point.”

Traditional treatment would have required Brooke to undergo surgery to lengthen the rods every six months, until she stopped growing.

Lynise said, “So that would’ve been, you know, 10 surgeries she might’ve had to have.”

Brooke was one of the first patients to have “magnetic” growing rods implanted. Now, instead of surgery, her doctors use a non-invasive, magnetic remote control to adjust them.

Pediatric orthopedic surgeon and professor and chief of Pediatric Orthopedics at Monroe Carell Jr Children’s Hospital at Vanderbilt University, Gregory Mencio, MD, said, “It’s an office visit every four months as opposed to an operative procedure every six to nine months. Pretty good trade off.”

And Dr. Mencio points out, no more surgeries also means no more X-rays or anesthesia. It also means Brooke can spend more time at the dojo instead of the hospital.

Because the magnetic growing rods are non-invasive, they can be adjusted more frequently and some doctors believe this will allow them to get an even better handle on a child’s scoliosis.