Home traction kit August 15th 2008

So off we trotted to the children's ward accompanied by the sister who proceeded to lecture us on how we should leave it to the professionals to look after our daughter, how it was not such a good idea to do this at home. We were a bit stunned, it wasn't our idea we explained but the consultant's.

We arrived in the ward to be greeted with 'what home traction kit - it doesn't exist!'

So before we knew it Emma was choosing a bed and I was filling in a form with the nurse who then asked 'so who will be staying tonight?' Then the penny dropped Emma was being admitted, there was nothing for us to take home - yet, and it was best we observed how to look after her in traction.

Unfortunately we hadn't been prepared for this and neither had Emma, 'am I staying?' She asked.

The traction kit ended up being two rubber straps to which a cord was attached, some brackets to add to the end of the bed, pulleys, weights and bandages - not quite the slightly higher tech image we had in mind.

We ended up staying two nights. Emma was in pain the first night but managed to drift off to sleep.

In the meantime Andy got busy! He'd measured up the hospital bed and with the help of B&Q and some welding help from a local business, Andy made our own frame to fit onto the end of Emma's bed at home.

We wanted Emma to be home, the consultant said we could do the traction at home, but the staff in the children's ward seemed less convinced. Andy brought the frame into the hospital to show the doctor and nurses and home support staff. They were impressed! It took some persuation still to convince the doctor we will do this properly, we wanted Emma to stretch her leg we were not going to cut corners. The doctor wanted Emma to stay another week, but after discussing the issues with the consultant the doctor let us home to try home-traction for just over a week.

The home visit staff arrived to check everythink was OK and to set up the traction. We had to jack-up the end of the bed to counter-balance Emma's weight against the weight of the weights.

One problem with this kind of traction is the bandages slipping down the legs and the weights reaching the floor during the night. So I came up with a cunning plan!

Traction alarm

I made use of my elder daughter's electronics kit. With some thin wire I adapted a switch circuit that played the loudspeaker when the circuit was closed. I attached the wires to the circuit board and laid this outside our door, then run the wires under the carpet into the girls bedroom and under the bed. I attached the other end of the wires to the simple switch and taped this to the carpet, aligning it under the weight. If the weight should reach the ground the weight itself would then close the switch and activate the loudspeaker.

That second night with my alarm in place we were woken to 'happy birthday' about 8 times!!! Poor Andy had to get up and pull Emma up the bed each time.

The next day he raised the end of Emma's bed a little higher!