By Elvin Carl Croker

THE Ptolemy Reid Rehabilitation Centre (PRRC) has recorded its highest number of orders for prosthetic limbs to date this year.

Physiotherapist of the centre, Dexter George, said 150 orders have been received for the year so far which stands for recorded information only at the centre and that there are others in other regions of Guyana. He said comparatively in 2017, the centre recorded a total of only 37 persons with amputations, while by the end of 2018, the number was 64.
George who was at the time guest speaker at the launch of the Juvenile Diabetes Foundation last week, held at Cara Lodge, said the start of the foundation signalled a significant step because starting at a juvenile level is the right age group to educate persons of the disease.

“It is better to have a preventative method, which is why the centre is in support of the foundation,” he said.

He related that on average recently, two to three new amputees would visit the centre weekly; this he said is cause for greater awareness in relation to prevention, self-care and management, from government level, community level and a personal level.
Addressing its social effect, the physiotherapist, who has been at the PRRC for the past 10 years, said persons with amputations are affected economically, physiologically and socially and their outlook on society and how society sees them changes.
“Combating diabetes is not just only looking at what you eat, but also your lifestyle and education. There are long-term ramifications if you do not do the right thing, it affects everybody,” he said.

He explained that when persons come with their amputations, the centre re-educates them on self-care and management and after supplying them with the prosthetic limb and training them on how to use it, they are then led back into society.

“But the real fact is that sometimes society does not accept them,” he said.
He said the centre sells the limbs at a cost that is not with profit. He, however, said that the cost to make the limbs is very high and ranges about from $200,000 to $500,000, depending on the type of material being used. This cost, he noted, is purely for the materials only which have to be imported and do not entail labour and other costs.

The PRRC, which forms part of the national rehabilitation complex in Guyana, is the only place in Guyana that makes prosthetic limbs and attends to persons with amputations. George said that the role of the centre is to show that life with amputation continues. As such, the institution plans to launch an amputee society soon.