I am in need of some information and descriptions of personal experience with bone stimulator machines.
I have some arthritis here and there, with most serious problems in my feet. An arthrodesis was done six months ago to fuse the great toe knuckle. The attempt to fuse the two bones was not successful because new bone did not grow in the sculpted
cup-and-cone interface.
The surgery was repeated last week. There are few options left if this does not work, except continuous dependence on the hardware in the foot to keep it all together. The long term prospect of hardware failure is high, plus micro-motion of component parts could be painful and add to the failure probability.
My surgeon and other respected medical aquaintances seem to be doubtful about the benefit of bone stimulator machines, but the surgeon is at the "try everything" stage and has suggested I use one.
Apparently several different types of machines are available, in sizes ranging from hand-held wands to strap-on book-sized units to even larger machines. I am certain some of these are of no use whatsoever, and am having difficulty finding any evidence, empirical or otherwise, that any of them truly stimulate bone growth in fractures or surgical situations. Implantable devices may be beneficial, but that is outside of my current need.
PLEASE, if anyone has any experience or knowledge of how beneficial any specific machine has been, give me some details. I will need to go forward with this soon, but am presently not willing to do so without some confidence it will work because of the cost involved. The whole concept is a little like black magic or voodoo to me, so you could call me suspicious.
Thanks in advance for your help. I will appreciate it very much.