Limb Lengthening Forum
Limb Lengthening Surgery => Limb Lengthening Discussions => Topic started by: GiantDwarfs on November 12, 2014, 04:03:10 PM
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What's the diferents on performing LL on femur or tibia?
anny positive or negative sites?
Why do only femur or then only tibia?
what decides on which to perfrom on?
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in my opinion tibia lengthening is better in the long run. You dont mess with the anatomical/mechanical axis of the bone, which you do when lengthening femur.
Also, its debated if the muscles can completely recover to pre-op strength, but regardless they are affected and changed in som way since they are stretched out. the thigh muscle is the most important muscle for movement since it basically controls your legs when you walk and run. While the calf muscles are mainly used to move the feet and to act as a damper when the feet touch the ground. So movement would be less affected by stretching the calf muscles.
Of course if you lengthen the tibia a whole lot and it gets longer than the femur, then that might a bad option, since tibias are supposed to shorter than femurs naturally it seems. It might make the strides messed up.
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As far as biomechanics go tibia>femur, And IMO it looks much better.
Here is some info i found.
Just recently there was this debate on a health and fitness forum about barbell squats. In particular, femur length and squats. The actual issue was the ratio of the lengths of the tibia and femur and whether this made squatting difficult for people who have relatively long femurs. (Of course, the concept of “relatively long” was missed, and replies like “I know this guy who’s 6’5″ and he can do ass to grass squats without any difficulty, so everyone else is just making excuses” followed. So it had to be pointed out that the same problem can be expressed in terms of having a relatively short tibia compared to the femur.) I have known since university that neanderthals had a relatively long femur compared to the length of the tibia, but it’s hard to tell and journal articles post ratios of actual bone lengths and you can’t very easily measure your own bones while you are still alive.
In any case, it made me do some research and I found amongst other things this article and apparently yes, having a relatively long femur compared to you tibia does indeed give you a significant mechanical disadvantage for squatting in a normal stance. This is rectified by taking a wider stance, so that the torso (and center of gravity) goes between the feet, rather than trying to keep your center of gravity over the feet, which is not physically possible if you have a short shin plus a long femur, because your center of gravity is further back and you either fall backwards, or you have to lean so far forward to stay balanced when your legs are horizontal to the ground, that a) you can’t physically get any lower because your torso and quadriceps can’t occupy the same space at the same time and b) if you try that with a barbell on your back you’ll do your lower back in.
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I think most doctors recommend tibias if you plan to do only one surgery. One advantage I can think about doing femurs is that recovery is supposed to be a little smoother than with tibia lengthening, at least if you do internal femurs.
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I don't think it makes that much of a difference in the long run.
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I thought femur had less complications and was better overall but now that I think about it I didn't base that assumption on anything.
Is tibia really better then? I know internals can damage the knee and externals are a chore with increased recovery time and all.
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Most doctors I've consulted suggest bilateral tibia. Even if you're hoping to lengthen both parts of your legs, they'll suggest tibia first.
Don't lengthen femur only, as disproportionally long femur makes you look like a gorilla... It is just not aesthetically beauty.
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I agree. For 1 Op only, always do tibias.
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What about people like Shyshy and OldieButGoldie who did femur only and made a recovery just as good as most tibia patients. Also think they look fine and proportionate afterwards.
Is it really that big of a deal which bone you lenghten? I plan on doing 4-5CM should I do tibia instead of femur and in that case which method would be best?
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For 6.5+ CM, you can only recover fully if you do femurs, it seems. If you do 6.5CM+ on tibiae, the Achilles tendon doesn't seem to retain its strength as it stretches, and you lose explosiveness and balance. If you do less than 6.5CM, then it shouldn't make much of a difference which segment you pick, as long as the LL is done right.
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Ok thanks Taller