Re: question re: relapse

May 9, 2004

Tia,

I don't think they are seeing more relapses overall. There was a

large group of kids treated with the method in Iowa in the past

several years who are now reaching an age of about 4, and some of

those had discontinued the brace on the early side, around 2-3,

sometimes because of following up with different doctors who said

that it was OK to stop, and others who were released early because of

being loose ligamented, which is now I understand being handled

differently.

The relapse risk declines gradually as the child grows older, but

since it isn't known which child will relapse, the brace is used to

guard against the possibility. A child released on the early side of

2-4 won't necessarily relapse, but the chance is higher.

In past decades of the method, a certain (larger) percentage relapsed

at some point, and were treated with the ATTT. I think now with

overcorrecting in the last cast, and continuing with the brace to the

high end of the 2-4 range, they have figured out how to minimize that

percentage. Here is a link to a post about a paper very recently

presented by Dr. Morcuende:

Remember that clubfoot is a condition that remains active for several

years, and relapse is something that needs to be guarded against no

matter how the foot was originally corrected, even with surgery.

This is my understanding .. hope this helps..

and Claire

> this may have been covered in the archives and i didn't see it, but

> why after 50 years of this type of correction is there all of a

> sudden so many cases of relapse? is this with other doctors that

> are practicing dr. p's technique or just his patients? just

curious

> as to why this is now happening. i am so thankful to know this and

> not have to worry about kelby relapsing and having to go thru

> surgery and casting again. like i said, just curious. thanks for

> any info!

> Tia

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