Prof. Dr. Thomas Wirth

Patients with skeletal dysplasias, syndromes involving the musculoskeletal system or soft bones develop numerous deformities on bones and joints or the spine. Treatment is difficult because of the accompanying short stature and requires the joint efforts of orthopaedic technicians and orthopaedists. Participants learn about aspects of particular relevance for patients as well as treatment challenges. While the individual clinical pictures are rare, the patient group as a whole is large.

In staged therapy systems, deformities and functional limitations of varying severity can be treated using a multitude of orthoses as well as orthopaedic-surgical measures. The goal is to improve the shape – ideally a normalisation of the deformity and thus optimisation of function. Using the foot and crouch gait as examples, participants learn about current orthotic and surgical measures and their mutual interactions, with the goal of obtaining the optimal functional result for the patient.