Doctors at Loyola Medicine perform special operation to preserve mobility for boy who had part of leg amputated

Loyola University Medical Center in Maywood, Illinois, used performed a complex operation to preserve mobility for a 3-year-old boy who had to have part of his leg amputated after suffering a horrific accident with a lawnmower.

Cohen Liggett loved to run and play until the accident last summer. He had to have part of his leg amputated, but doctors at Loyola performed a rotationplasty to turn his ankle joint into a knee joint.

The operation allowed Cohen to retain more mobility and have better options for prosthetics, Loyola said.

It was September of last year when Cohen was taken by helicopter to Loyola Medicine for his injuries in the lawnmower accident. He had suffered an extensive injury to his medial thigh, and most of his distal femur and patella bones were destroyed — along with the skin and muscle over them, Loyola said.

Cohen had to have part of his leg amputated, but doctors worked to ensure he would be able to retain some mobility.

"He's so young," orthopaedic surgeon Dr. Thomas Hodo said in a news release. "He was only 3 years old, so I'm trying to figure out an option for him that will allow him to be somewhat of a normal kid, to have good function, to minimize the amount of surgeries we need to have over his lifetime." 

After consulting over several days with Cohen's parents, doctors decided to go with a rotationplasty. The procedure involves salvaging of the knee joint.

In Cohen's case, his distal femur bone was amputated, and his tibia bone was rotated 180 degrees and fused with what remained of his femur. This turned his ankle joint into a new knee joint.

Cohen's parents were pleased with the results.

"Dr. Hodo was just so kind and talking it out with us for days on end until we came to this decision that we were like, this rotationplasty will give him the best option for mobility in the future," Cohen's mom, Jacki, said in the release. "He's still going to be able to do all the things that a 4-year-old (at the time he was 3) do."

After the rotationplasty was completed, Cohen had to spend a month in the hospital and go through rehab and prosthetic fittings. Now he has what he calls a "robot leg."

Doctors also did everything possible to explain to Cohen what was happening, even creating a "Cohen doll" that has also undergone a rotationplasty. The operating room was filled with guitar music that Cohen had played, decorations, bubbles, and toys for a boy that Cohen's dad, Adam, said "can't be kept down."

"Cohen did great, honestly, better than I would expect in a kid his age," Dr. Hodo said in the release. "But Cohen is very resilient. He was never freaked out by the whole idea of having his 'leg on backwards', as some would say. He has a great range of motion in his ankle, which will allow him to have a great ability to use his prostheses. I would attribute that to his wonderful parents who have educated him well about his situation and also worked really hard with him."

Cohen is now back to many activities that could have been impossible without the doctors' efforts, including getting his training wheels off his specialized bike that has been fit for his prosthesis.