Orthopaedic appliance and rehabilitation guidance centre · Consultation & fitment of orthotics, prosthetics and mobility aids · Kalyan West since 2006
Braces & supports
A brace does one of six jobs. Which one matters.
An orthosis supports, corrects, protects, restricts, offloads or enables. A brace that is doing the wrong one of those is uncomfortable at best, and at worst it is quietly making the problem it was meant to help.
What a brace is for
Your doctor decides which of these applies. What is made here follows from that.
- ✓To support a limb whose muscles cannot hold it — after polio, stroke or nerve injury
- ✓To hold a correction while a child grows
- ✓To protect a bone or a repair while it heals
- ✓To allow a controlled amount of movement and block the rest
- ✓To take weight off a painful joint or an ulcer
- ✓To make walking possible, or safe, or less exhausting
By part of the body
Foot & ankle
Knee
Hip & whole leg
Spine
Neck
Hand & arm
Ready-made or made to measure?
Both have their place and neither is automatically better. A stock knee brace or a soft collar, correctly sized, does the job for a straightforward case and costs a fraction of a custom one. A limb that is a shape no stock item fits — a foot after polio, a child growing through a correction, a leg with a deformity — needs a cast taken and something built on it.
The wrong version of that decision is the expensive one. A custom brace bought where a stock one would have done is money wasted; a stock brace forced onto a limb that needed a custom one produces pressure sores, and gets abandoned in a fortnight.
Children
A child in a brace is a repeat appointment, not a single fitting. They grow out of it — often in months — and a brace that has been outgrown stops correcting and starts pressing. Come back when the shoe stops fitting, when a mark appears that did not before, or when your child starts finding reasons not to wear it. That last one is usually the earliest sign.
Bring the prescription and the limb
A brace is made from a measurement and a doctor's intention. Bring the letter, and bring any brace already being used — including one that has been abandoned, because why it was abandoned is useful information.
5, Jasraj Society, Vallipir Road, Kalyan (West), Thane — 421301 · Closed Saturday · Closed 2–6 p.m. on weekdays