On March 15, 2008, the Ukranian Dr. Vitaliy Veklich called together a number of his young patients in treatment for achondroplasia. This was done in hopes of sharing community results of his limb lengthening treatment using the Ilizarov-Veklich apparatus.
Achondroplasia, an autosomal dominant genetic disorder that causes dwarfism, involves a deformation in one of the genes necessary for proper cartilage formation. As a result, children with the disease are often much shorter in stature than their peers.
Developed by Professor Gavriil Ilizarov, in Kurgan, Russia in the mid-twentieth century, this apparatus lengthens the leg bones slowly over several treatments. Dr. Veklich has redesigned the original apparatus with the goal of being safer and more reliable. Presently, the treatment involves three separate lengthening treatments at two distinct periods of development. Each stage takes 5 months and there is a 3 month period between stages.
At this meeting, not only did patients and their parents get to learn more about the results others had experienced, but also witnessed the specific improvements of an individual patient as he completed his treatments. There are high hopes that this method of therapy will open the door to better treatments for achondroplasia.
For more information about the Ladisten Orthopedic clinic in Kiev, Ukraine, and the children treated there, visit the following website: http://www.doctorveklich.com/
