BABY CRIPPLE

Greymouth Evening Star, 20 June 1936, Page 12

BABY CRIPPLE

"JIU-JITSU” TREATMENT. Eight months ago in London a baby was born —a hopeless cripple. His little feet were turned under so that the instep was where the sole of the foot should be, and he had no heels. A month ago, after a few months’ treatment at the Children’s Hospital, Great Ormond street,' London, his mother was told that he would be able to learn to walk just like other children.

“There is no reason why children born cripples should not now become professional footballers,” Mr. Denis Browne, the orthopaedic surgeon at the hospital told a Press representative. Since Thelma Wright (whose cure after eight years’ treatment was recently reported) first attended the hospital, the technique employed has advanced to such an extent that it is quite usual to have cripple children walking normally in twelve months instead of eight years. Mr. Browne, who has devoted fifteen years’ research lo the subject, demonstrated how it Is done. “The trick is to jiu-jitsu the feet into growing right themselves,” he said.

He gently turned a baby’s foot around so that it was in the-normal position. Then he strapped a tiny splint so that a bar ran up the side of the leg, and another bar along the sole of the foot. The other foot was treated the same way and both feet arranged so that if the child was standing they wdUld be in the ordinary walking position.