5-year-old Gets Racing Legs

Posted by Miss Cellania in Baby & Kids, Medicine on April 16, 2009 at 9:28 am


Ellie May Challis of Little Clacton, Essex, England battled meningitis as an infant. She recovered, but her arms and legs had to be amputated. She has since used normal prosthetic legs which were were painful and slow. Now five years old, Ellie has new carbon framed legs, the kind amputee sprinters use.

She was fitted with them three weeks ago – making her the youngest person in the world to have the £10,000 a pair special limbs.

Paul Challis, 45, said: “Ellie can walk twice as fast on these new legs. She is so full of determination.”

The company’s managing director Bob Watts said: “We had to make them especially for Ellie as they had never been made this small before. We were worried that she wouldn’t be able to balance properly on them, but she has made amazing progress.

Ellie’s legs will be replaced every two years as she grows. Link -via Arbroath


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COMMENT

8 comments to "5-year-old Gets Racing Legs"

  1. Gauldar
    April 16th, 2009 at 9:48 am

    Wow, replaced every two years. I hope her progress keeps up as she gets older, and she may even be involved in the forefront of amputee technologies as she gets older. Cyborg tech FTW!

  2. Gadget Sleuth
    April 16th, 2009 at 11:37 am

    Good news (sort of, as procedures every two years doesn't sound fun).

  3. Jigore
    April 16th, 2009 at 1:42 pm

    10000£ every 2 years

  4. Gauldar
    April 16th, 2009 at 1:51 pm

    Wonder if they can get a discount for a trade-in.

  5. Skipweasel
    April 16th, 2009 at 3:20 pm

    Ah, the joys of the NHS.

    I don't suppose there's /any/ chance of the old legs being reused somewhere deserving.

  6. ivymae
    April 16th, 2009 at 5:06 pm

    Go Ellie go!

    The 50,000 pounds raised by fundraising is amazing.

  7. Foreigner1
    April 17th, 2009 at 3:58 am

    Some funding by fundraising, some researchfunds from the company itself and that for the rest of her life because she is the Ultimate testbench for those legs.

    She'll be the ultimate expert on these things with both her legs and her arms. And no it won't be only every 2 years- She'll have to revisit the labs sometimes every week because there'll be tweaking and adjusting and testing if it all works properly needed and she'll feel things and she'll have remarks and suggestions and more improvements needed and she'll need therapy and help for her stumps and for the effects of the enclosures of the stumpcups and so on. And then some times there will be tch's who want to try out new stuff on her because she is young and she can adjust fast enough and she has lots of experience.

    The's one person who already has a job for life.

  8. ersatz
    April 17th, 2009 at 5:42 am

    get her running now and she'll be able to kick the crap out of any Olympic sprinter in 10 years.

    I'd rather have hands than legs though.


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