Despite the best efforts of winter storm Stella to wreak winter havoc with the SPRING Amputee Walking School, the show must go on - even if it was a week later! The morning of 3/15/17 started off with Todd and Dennis - the lecturers - having their flight into Baltimore cancelled due to poor weather in the Northeast. Organizers at the University of Maryland Rehabilitation and Orthopaedic Institute (UMROI) and co-hosts the Amputee Support Group and Dankmeyer, Inc. quickly moved to make arrangements to hold the event one week later on 3/22/17. Program attendees were notified of the change and calendars were re-marked! Participants assembled on the new day and had a very successful event.
As always, Amputee Walking School is designed to bring Paralympians Todd Schaffhauser and Dennis Oehler, self-styled “professional amputees”, together with other amputees and their families, physical therapists, prosthetists and support staff - to teach and practice training exercises for lower limb amputees. Todd and Dennis, both lower limb amputees, co-founded the Amputee Walking School (AWS) in 1989 to take amputees beyond traditional rehabilitation.
Professionals attended the afternoon lecture session before regrouping with patients and their families for the evening session. Some attendees were returning to display progress made since their previous session. Newcomers were learning for the first time the exercises and were able to benefit from working with the others. One of the younger attendees met Dankmeyer's 3DPO intern and had a great time entertaining him - very creatively building an obstacle course the two of them could negotiate. (If you would like to read more about 3DPO, you can click here.)
Announcing new location and course content for 6/21/2017
Dankmeyer, Inc - one of the co-hosts, was pleased to announce that the June 21, 2017 session would be held at Dankmeyer's Linthicum office. In addition to switching up the location, the professional content will be new - Lower Limb Prosthesis Prescription and Training Considerations. Todd and Dennis will be joined by Mark Hopkins, CPO, PT, MBA and Megan Sions, PT, PhD, DPT as lecturers. This physical therapy education session will be held from 9-4, with lunch provided. Amputees will be welcome to attend that as well as the evening Walking School from 4-7. Applications have been submitted for Physical Therapy continuing education credits. Registration information will be forthcoming, so mark your calendars.
Now, enjoy some pictures of the action!
