Nevedac Prosthetic Centre in Chandigarh: Providing artificial limbs to the disabled

Vohra displays the artificial hand: Practical and useful aidsTen kilometres from Chandigarh, is a six-acre campus in which, over the years several hundred people have been given a second chance in life. The Nevedac Prosthetic Centre has been working on a modest scale to provide artificial limbs to the disabled. But its truly prominent success is a mechanical hand which permits its user to return to at least a semblance of his normal existence. The centre is the only place in India where such hands are made.Says the centre's director, 61-year-old D. S. Vohra: "So far only cosmetic hands were manufactured in India. They look presentable but are of no utility whatsoever." Vohra, a former colonel in the Indian Army, has had a chequered career. An automobile engineer by profession, his break came in 1946 when, after the Second World War, the Indian Government decided to set up an organisation to manufacture artificial limbs for war casualties. Vohra was selected, sent for an 18-month training stint to England, and returned to become the first director of the Artificial Limbs Centre (ALC) at Pune.He was director for seven years and later quit the army in 1967. After he left, he was made several offers. The Maharashtra Government wanted Vohra to set up a prosthetic centre in Nagpur for civilians, since the ALC dealt primarily with the disabled in the military. The Haryana Government also sent out feelers.Says Vohra, who seems to take most things quite cheerfully: "Bureaucracy being what it is, nothing was moving." At around that time Uma Daulat Singh, whose husband, Lieutenant-General Daulat Singh had been killed in an air-crash in November 1963, got in touch with him. A village, Daulat singh wala, had been named after the general, and she wanted Vohra to start a limb centre there. And in October 1973 Vohra's outfit came into being.Rehabilitation Equipment: Work began in full swing in 1975. Besides limbs, rehabilitation equipment like wheel chairs and crutches were also produced. It was only later that Vohra started thinking in terms of the mechanical hand which, though popular in some western countries, has been largely ignored in underdeveloped nations.A carpenter practises using his new libm: Enabled to do a useful jobSays Vohra: "What struck me most was that though military casualties were well provided for, if a civilian lost his hands it often meant hunger and the break-up of his family. Among the poor, a landless man was considered a liability."The mechanical hand, as it now exists, is detachable from the artificial limb at the wrist. The thumb and the fingers are made of an aluminium alloy and are connected to a kind of axle which is mounted along the inside of the knuckles.A cord made from alligator skin runs from this axle, up the artificial limb, and is fitted under the opposite shoulder - thus, if the right hand is artificial, the cord runs under the left shoulder. When the opposite shoulder muscles are tensed, the fingers and thumb of the mechanical hand open automatically due to the cord's tension. The muscles are relaxed to let the fingers close round an object.The hand was first tested 30 months ago when Kuldip Kaur, a young schoolteacher from Ambala, came as a patient. In a property dispute, her elder brother attacked her and cut off both her hands. As a consequence she also lost her job.For two months she stayed at the centre and had a new pair of hands fitted. Then came the difficult period of rehabilitation when Kaur was taught to use them, to do her household chores, to eat, and finally to write. Two months later she was back in her job.Since then, the stream of patients has been more or less continuous. In a year, about 600 people receive new hands and legs. About 350 are hand amputees and as Vohra says, "95 per cent are victims of the deadly thresher. Every single village in Punjab has at least one or more thresher victims."When an amputee arrives a plaster cast of his stump is taken. Adjustment of the limb to fit the stump takes some time and if the patient is from out of town, he is put up in a 40-bed dormitory attached to the centre. After the hand is finally fitted, the patient is made to go through his daily routine at the campus itself. Attachments are also provided.If for example a farm labourer wants to cut his crop, he can take off his mechanical hand to attach on a sickle. If a man wants to wield a hammer, he can use an attachment with a good grip which will make his work easier. Though the cost of a hand is high - it is about Rs 600 for a below-elbow amputee - a recent government scheme permits poorer people to get new limbs free.Vohra is the first to acknowledge that his centre is hardly capable of coping with the rush. "Our capacity is inadequate," he says, and adds that they are now trying to expand to accommodate 75 to 100 patients a month. While this may take some time, what is amazing is the utter lack of effort in this direction in other parts of the country.Published By: AtMigration Published On: Oct 26, 2013 10:57 IST--- ENDS ---

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Nevedac Prosthetic Centre in Chandigarh: Providing artificial limbs to the disabled

Ten kilometres from Chandigarh, is a six-acre campus in which, over the years several hundred people have been given a second chance in life. The Nevedac Prosthetic Centre has been working on a modest scale to provide artificial limbs to the disabled.

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