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I Wish I Was a Little Bit Taller

Like most cosmetic surgeries designed to make you a hotter version of yourself, cosmetic leg lengthening was originally intended to help patients with real and sometimes dire conditions. The procedure was developed in the 1950s by a Soviet orthopedic surgeon named Gavriil Ilizarov, who wanted to treat complex bone fractures and deformities like limb discrepancies.

It involves a medieval-sounding device called the Ilizarov frame, an adjustable apparatus that is wrapped around, say, the lower part of a patient’s leg, ankle to knee, like scaffolding erected around a townhome.

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Articles of Interest

'I have to be taller': the unregulated world of India's limb-lengthening industry

Young Indians are paying for complex, painful procedures despite the absence of medical oversight in the race to improve career and marriage prospects

Broken Is Beautiful

Breaking your legs to make yourself taller.

Current concepts of leg lengthening

The young and rocky history of surgical leg lengthening started only 100 years ago, probably when the German visionary surgeon Bernhard von Langenbeck 1869 claimed that 2–4-cm leg shortening causes significant impairment of function and that it should be equalised surgically by stretching of the bone.

He Was 5'7". After Surgery, He’ll Be 5'10".

Originally designed to correct mismatched length in legs, limb-lengthening surgery has become more popular for men looking to permanently increase their height.

Limb lengthening history, evolution, complications and current concepts

Limb lengthening continues to be a real challenge to both the patient and the orthopaedic surgeon. Although it is not a difficult operative problem, there is a long and exhausting postoperative commitment which can jeopardize early good results.

Limb Lengthening Surgery: Is It Worth It?

People who want to increase their height by having lengthening surgery go through a long decision-making process due to the 3-5 months treatment period and high costs. For this reason, one of the most common questions about limb lengthening surgery is this: "Is it worth it?" We asked this question directly to our three patients who had this surgery and shared their feedback in our article.

Limb Lengthening: The Process

Typically, the process take several months. Limb lengthening can also be combined with gradual or acute deformity correction.

Limb-lengthening surgery: A look at the pros and cons

Everyone undergoing limb lengthening will have complications. It’s a matter of what those complications will be and how quickly we can detect and reverse them. With planning before surgery and a very careful approach during surgery, we can minimize the risk and complications.

These Italian Dwarfs Love Getting Their Bones Broken

The idea of physically stretching a dwarf out sort of blew my mind, so I got in touch with Emanuele Satolli, an Italian photographer who has been documenting achondroplasia sufferers undergoing treatment, to find out more.

Young Woman Gains Inches, Self Confidence

When Caitlin Schroeder was 13 years old, she couldn't reach the kitchen sink. Caitlin, who was born with dwarfism, opted to undergo a painful and lengthy surgical procedure to add some five and a half inches to her stature.

Resources

International Center for Limb Lengthening

The International Center for Limb Lengthening is the most experienced center for limb lengthening and deformity correction in North America. Our patients have come from over 60 countries and six continents to receive comprehensive orthopedic treatment by our world-renowned team.

LimbLengthening.com

Our surgeons offer surgical treatments for the correction of upper and lower limb deformities, discrepancies, and injuries in adults and children. We help individuals with orthopaedic issues due to trauma, birth defects, infections or bone tumors. Our aim is to use the best tools available today — from hexapod external fixation to internal limb lengthening devices,

Limbplastx Institute

Led by Dr. Kevin Debiparshad, a Harvard-trained surgeon, LimbplastX is widely recognized for using the most innovative and advanced techniques for cosmetic limb-lengthening.

Wanna Be Taller

As there is not satisfactory information about limb lengthening surgery in the world including Turkey, we decided to bring together successful doctors with patients who want to length their height with a site system. This site was founded by a team that had previously undergone surgery, experienced the process personally and did a lot of research on LL surgery.