Surgery: splint – brace – or bandage – Orthopedic bandage – Skeletal traction applicator
Patent
1995-06-02
1997-06-10
Apley, Richard J.
Surgery: splint, brace, or bandage
Orthopedic bandage
Skeletal traction applicator
602 32, 606241, 601 23, A61F 500
Patent
active
056370792
DESCRIPTION:
BRIEF SUMMARY
This invention relates to a traction apparatus and in particular a traction device for stretching the human back.
For many people, the time spent daily in a vertical posture, subjecting the spine to the compressive effects of gravity, causes discomfort to the back. Some people seek to relieve this discomfort by stretching their back but find it physically difficult to effect the desired stretch.
To seek relief from such discomfort a person may undertake treatment under medical supervision of a doctor, physiotherapist or chiropractor. Such treatment will invariably involve the use of some form of traction to provide a small distance of inter-vertebral separation, for a short or long period of time, in order to effect relief of pain or other symptoms associated with disorders of the spine. A difficulty of these known types of treatment, whether they be administered on a traction couch or table, in a bed, or on a chair, is that they require medical supervision to ensure that they are set up correctly, and generally cannot be set up readily at home, with perhaps the exception of cervical traction in extremely limited circumstances.
There have been other apparatus proposed to stretch a persons back, such as, for example, a product known as "gravity boots", being footwear having a clip on each for engaging a horizontal bar so as to enable the wearer to be suspended upside down from the horizontal bar. In addition, also known are inversion tables, on which a user leans while standing with his or her feet restrained, and by altering their weight over a pivot point may cause the table to rotate thereabout, causing their feet to be displaced to an uppermost position from which their body hangs relieving compressive forces exerted on the spine while so inverted. These proposals have the disadvantage that while they can be employed at home by the general public, they do require a level of athletic ability which can be beyond that of many people who would benefit from the use of the equipment.
It is an object of this invention to alleviate the aforementioned disadvantages by providing a traction apparatus which obviates or mitigates the aforementioned difficulties, or at least provides an alternative.
It is a preferred object of the invention to provide a traction apparatus which can be employed without supervision.
In accordance with one aspect of the present invention there is provided a traction apparatus for vertebral manipulation having a first tensile force application means for engaging the body of a person in proximity to the upper thorax, and having a second tensile force application means for attaching to the body of said person in proximity to the lower lumbar region; said first and second attachment means being supported on respective first and second frame members mounted pivotally about each other, in relative spaced relationship to each other.
The frame members so arranged are adapted to exert a tensile force between the first tensile force application means and the second tensile force application means. The second tensile force application means may include an attachment point located on the second frame member. The tensile force is derived from force applied on the frame members when the traction apparatus is in use, and is derived from force due to gravity applied by the mass of said person. In the most preferred form of the invention the force is applied oblique to the direction of the tensile force, when the traction apparatus is in use. The frame members conveniently may each be in the form of a U shape.
Preferably said frame members are arranged to prescribe spatial movement of said first and second tensile force application means relative to each other.
Preferably said frame members respectively comprise a pair of first elongate struts and a pair of second elongate struts, each strut of said pair being arranged in side by side relationship, each said first elongate strut being pivotally mounted to a respective second elongate strut about an axis located along each strut away from either end ther
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patent: 4608969 (1986-09-01), Hamlin
patent: 5163890 (1992-11-01), Perry, Jr.
patent: 5217488 (1993-06-01), Wu
Apley Richard J.
Clark Jeanne M.
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