New titanium parts...
 

Hey guys I just arrived home mid afternoon from the base Hospital. I spent the night there after receiving surgery on my left ear. It all started back in 1964 when I was in a childrens home. I went through a six month period experiencing massive ear aches, and the nurse could not figure out what the problem was. Finally I was sent to the hospital for a check up and found out that there was a piece of cotton rotting in my ear. go figure, right? It got so bad that reconstructive surgery had to be done using bones for other areas for my inner ear, and a new ear drum was installed. Over the years my hearing slowly faded and was down to about 25%.:diablo:

So yesterday my surgeon did an exploitory sergery and found that there was some replacement bones installed way back when, but the bones were now broken. So considering todays technology he installed a prostetic device in place of the bones. It is a titanium pin mounted with a titanium sleave much like a "chinese finger" onto the bone that attaches to the nerve that transmits signals to the brain. On the opposite end is a titanium plate which sits directly behind the ear drum and vibrates with the drum transmitting the signal to my brain.

Now even with my ear packed full of crap for drainage I can hear better already. It will be a full two months before I am able to realize the full extent of the improvement. The coolest part is that my ear canal was large enough for him to do the whole surgery without cutting into my skull, and I have absolutely no pain what so ever:lol:. I still have Percacet just in case:intello:. I feel like I have a bionic ear now. Pretty cool stuff, huh? Just wanted to share the good news with you guys.:party:

Good to hear man. Hopefully your ear gets better still. Anyway I too have a few metal parts surgically implanted. My right femur is being held together but a fair whack of Titanium and I also have a metal plate on the right side of my head. :lol:

From what?
 

WOW from what? Sounds like you had some kind of accident, or is this from battle of some kind?

That's good news Jerry! I'm happy for you. My uncle has ungracefully stepped off his motorbike a few times and is now walking around on titanium:lol:

Pretty cool that you'll probably be able to hear better than you can remember. Good luck with the "bionic" ear. Wonder how the cotton got there in the first palce.

Cool story Jerry, I am glad to "hear" that you are hearing much better. Got to love our technology though, they have something for just about everything now.

Better, stronger, faster; the 6 million dollar man! lol

Seriously, that's cool to hear (no pun intended). Although, when I saw the thread title, I just assumed you got new R/C titanium parts.

Touche, I thought he was talking RC as well.

I knew it would get you guys.
 

Sorry about that. I knew it would get your attention that way. I always try to think of a good title that will gain attention. When I look for new posts its always the tricky titles that gain my attention first. If the title sucks I rarely bother to open them. Just too much to read some days.

Anyway thanks for the praise guys. I thought it would make for an interesting read. I know I was amazed when the doctor told me what he could do in order to improve my hearing without using a hearing aid. I figured it was worth a shot considering my age. When he came in to see me yesterday and he did a tuning fork test even he was impressed with the results. He told me if my hearing was improved that much with all of the packing in my ear that it should be much better once everything heals up. He left some kind of liquid type of packing inside the inner ear that will take about three months for my body to desolve and consume, at which point the healing should be 100% completed, and then the final testing will be done. Of course he is disappointed that I will no longer be here in Seoul, Korea. We should be relocated in Prague within a few weeks(we hope). Usual Gov services dragging feet with red tape, procedure, and medical clearance type junk. Wish us luck.

That is just awesome man. At least your will be able to hear in stereo again. Just amazing what can be all done now in the medical field.

Maybe you will get HD radio with those as well!

Congrats on the surgery and glad it went well. Amazing what can be done these days.

One can only hope.
 

One can only hope. The only thing coming out of it right now is a trickle of blood. The outer packing was removed yesterday, but there is still packing inside the ear canal, and liquid packing in the inner ear. So it is kind of anoying for the moment. The funny thing is that I now have some Titanium "bling bling" but no one can see it. ha ha ha ha. I am hopeful for any level of improvement, and am actually expecting a huge differnance from what it was. Hopefully not just wishful thinking on my part. We shall see. Yea the technology they come up with these days is very cool even for the simplest things. Life is good. The wife is at work, and the kids just left for school. Home alone, yeaaaaa...

hey, good news. I hope it will heal all well, all the best for you. Myself, I had some titanium in my right leg, a so called "marrow nail, medullary nail, intramedullary nail". after 1,5 yrs it got removed (quite painful), and finally I have put it into my truggy, to improve the stiffness (poor quality of the chassis):
http://s8.directupload.net/images/091030/zc965esi.jpg


further I have some more nails and plates made of titanium in my left pelvis. but they will stay in there. cool stuff.

al

hahahahaha! Great way to re-use old parts florianz!!! love it!

I still have a metal rod in my femur as well. Been in there since 1995. I was suppose to take it out after a year or so, but I lost my insurance and decided to leave it in. But now I see a new use for the rod after I saw Florianz chassis mod.

I just had to cut off about 0.5 inches, thats it. :party: very easy mod, easy to cut with a saw. titanium is not that hard, but it's rugged, tough, but light. and the bloody aluminum chassis never got bent.
if the titanium doesen't make problems, you can leave it in. after more tan 2 years it's pretty hard to get out, anyways. and a shitload of hard work for the doc.

Oh crap! I forgot about this thread. Sorry for the late reply Jerry.

Anyway the femur was smashed during a skiing accident. I think that I was on the Widow maker, Spine buster or the Colostomizer run (:lol: watch too much Simpsons). Anyway it was an advanced run and me noob that thought he knew it all. What could go wrong? After tumbling down the hill for about 500 meters I came to a stop and realized that one of my legs wasn't looking so flash. Looked like it had two knee joints. They put a big rod and a few little screws. I was also meant to get the rod taken out but opted not to. Might be a mistake but hopefully not.

The head was a sport injury. My dad wouldn't allow me to play Aussie Rules Football because he thought it was too rough and a game for savages. So I ended up playing soccer instead. Anyway the short of it I got kicked in the head by an opponent and this caused some blood vessels to rupture on my brain. I thought I was OK and put up with the headache. For a few days I had a headache and didn't know what was wrong. I took heaps of Aspirin to try and stop the pain. Had the opposite effect. Aspirin thins out your blood and made the bleeding worse till the pressure inside my skull got so high I passed out. Don't remember too much of anything till after the surgery. I was pretty lucky in the sense that I made it to the hospital with no time to spare. They initially didn't fit any metal to my skull but just replaced the piece of bone they cut out and let it heal no it's own. Well it would have worked if I stayed still like the doctors told me to be. Instead I was moving about and just doing physical things I shouldn't. This cause the piece of my skull that was cut to move and not sit in it's place. The doctors thought I could not be trusted to stay still so they took me back to surgery and attached the piece of bone to the rest of the skull with metal. 12 years on I and other than a scar on the side of my head I have no real consequences from the whole ordeal. Very lucky and I thank the god for that every day.


And just as a side note to all people reading this. If you take a bump to the head and have a headache do NOT take Aspirin or any other drug that thins out your blood. This could be a very bad thing to do and almost cost me my life.

Wow sorry to hear.
 

WOW sorry to hear about your life or death ordeal. That was awful. At least you made it through, but I would be willing to bet that it will cause you more issues as you get into your twilight years. Your head injury warning is a good one, and we all learned something from Natasha (Leum Neason's former wife) who was subjected to a fall while skiing and did not think it was a big deal until she began to suffer from a headache and suddenly passed out. She was promounced dead a few hours later. Brain injuries routinely get overlooked, and end up costing someone their life. Glad to hear that you have moved on and seem to be doing well since that day. Peronally I have never gotten passed the bunny hill. I tried doing the downhill run one time, and spent about an hour getting up and falling down every couple of feet. Just could not get it. I can rollerskate all day long and waterski for hours, but the snow and skies just does not compute for me. I wish I could get the hang of it. Our youngest son loves to snowboard and wants me to join him, but at 51 I want to have both of my hips in place for the next 20+ years. Getting old sucks, but I do whatever I can to avoid injury.

I'll contribute some deets about the Ti deposits in my body...

Fell 45ft in 2006 which left me with a shattered knee cap, left femur clean fractured in two places, fractured left hip socket, left humerus clean fractured, broken jaw and a few broken teeth :whip: I can't divulge any information about the circumstances just yet. The net result is that I have Ti rods in my humerus and femur, Ti plates in my jaw, hip and knee cap. Took about 2 weeks for all the surgeries. The cool thing about the Ti rod implants is that they had me trying to walk a couple of days after my last surgery :rules:

A couple of silver linings from this mess:

1. Got into RC while I was recovering, which has led me to where I'm hanging out at RCM and drag racing.

2. IT'S GREAT TO BE ALIVE!

Alive is good.
 

Alive is good. Another silver lining in the midst of a tragity. Its good to see the glass half full. I always try to help people see the good in whatever happens to us in life. Look at this woman who won the lottery $190M and now has to share half with her abusive husband. Not divorced, and community property laws split everything 50/50. Still she was broke yesterday and now has $95M. Let God take care of the soon to be EX. Holding anger is very unhealthy and leads to nothing but pain. Glad to hear that you have been rebuilt and with the Bling Bling of titanium installed you can rest assure that it will out last your organic parts. Finding R/C and joining us here on RCM is a blessing. Of course winning the lottery would be nice to.

Yea, I still remember the first day I met Sunny. Goofball walked up like a baller with his super duper fast Rustler. Little did I know he had Ti bling installed.

Guessing
 

We are guessing that it did not help his personality?:lol::rofl::whistle: JK But maybe it made him more resiliant to our sense of humor??:intello:

:lol:He's a cool cat.

Humor gets us through a lot doesn't it Jerry? Yeah, I'm a bore to hang out with though... :lol: Yeah, I try to keep away from getting beat up on by the resident RCM roasters:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...8092502364.jpg

Sad thing about Holly Lahti too. But you're right, it's up to God to give his due at the proper time to the estranged husband who gets half her loot.

Edit: Thanks Romano

Happy
 

I'm always happy just to be a part of the RCM family, which gives me a place to share my life experiences and also recipricate advice on R/C stuff and personal as well. Life will dish out many life lessons that we will not be very pleased to receive, but we have to find our way through all of them and keep our head held high.

My first Ex treated me like doodoo for years, and God has now provided her with a face that no sober man would dare to wake up next to. My second EX created a lot of drama where there was no need for it and caused me a lot of pain over many years keeping me from seeing my children. She is with him now, or not. But we have our three youngest kids with us now, and their lives are so much better off for it. Even my former mother-in-law speaks about how greatful they are that the kids are with us now. They will always mourn their loss, but God works in mysterious ways for sure. I do believe that Karma is alive and well. Delivering payment for each of us for the way we treat our fellow man. Humor has to be a part of that somehow.

So to tie into the original theme of this thread... looks like it's a good thing you didn't have 100% hearing then? :lol: Man, yeah the trials we go through can definitely make us stronger or completely break us down. Glad that you're living better than ever Jerry, the best form of revenge in existence.

So how much longer before the gauze plugs come out of your ears? I bet it's gonna drive you wild how loud everything's gonna sound all of a sudden!

True that.
 

True that Sunny. My Moto is and always will be that "Life Is Good". We all have to suffer in various ways, but I believe that the character of a man is in how he responds and relates to the trials and tribulations that we face.

Yea the follow up appointment is on 28/Jan. I tried to get him to take them out before then, but he would not budge. Dr. Gilbert did another tuning fork test this week, and he told me that the results are looking better than expected. I am amazed already even with the gauze in there that my hearing has already improved. It's still too weird with all of that crap in my ear, but I have hope that things are going to be better.

Yea life sure has a strange sense of humor some days, but I am quite pleased for what I have and where I am at for an average guy at 51. Surrounded by my loving wife and my three youngest kids. Plus our five older successful kids is exactly what we live for. Everyone seems to be doing well and happiness is a part of our everyday life. How can I complain. Plus I have tons of titanium R/C parts in the shop. Whooohoooo. I can't wait to get settled in our new home in Prague. One of the garages will hold our new van, but the other side will be my new workshop. I have to work on plans for the new setup and get ready for some fun.

Fascinating Jerry - my son does have a bionic ear, well two actually

You're very lucky that the structure within your ear is sound & able to support the prosthetic

Which bone does it attach to - malleus, incus or directly to the stapes?

Not sure.
 

Not sure of the bone names, but from the technical description the Dr. provided the prostetic has a wire sleave much like a chinese finger that slips onto the bone keeping it in place, and that connects directly to the nerve leading to my brain. I had several surgeries as a young child because of an illness which casued sever damage to my eardrum, and apparently from this exploritory surgery the Dr. says there was alot of damage and some of the bones were replaced with bones from other areas of my body. I was only like 7 years old then and do not remember much at all about that ordeal. Unfortunately some of those bones are now broken. The pin actually bypasses the chain of bones or I guess replaces them altogether. On the opposite end of the pin there is a very thin titanium plate the sits just behind my eardrum and receives the vibrations from the eardrum and transmits them directly to the nerve. Pretty simple alternative actually, which is why I decided to go ahead with the surgery in the first place. The surgery took about 3.5 hours working with micro surgical tools using a microscope because everything is so tiny. From Dr. Gilbert's explanation it is kind of like working on R/C gear, only smaller. I have been amazed and also very happy that such a procedure exists. We are hopeful.

Well the ear's pretty tiny so they need to use a microscope :lol:

The cochlea implants attach 22 electrodes directly to the auditory nerve - which requires some drilling to access the nerve & more to mount the titainium implant!

My son has the latest version which uses Li-Ion batteries & has more maps for different sound siuations