- IN MEMORIAM IGNACIO PONSETI

Welcome to the web site of The Finnish Clubfoot Society (Suomen Kampurajalkayhdistys ry SKYRY)

Our nationwide society was founded in March 2003 and is meant for clubfoot patients and their families as well as for all other people interested in clubfeet. Our aim is to advance the treatment and rehabilitation and to offer peer support to the patients and their parents. The main functions of our society are giving personal support and sharing information.

To make these aims real the society offers information on the treatment and rehabilitation of clubfoot in Finland, arranges meetings and educational events as well as does some publishing. The society maintains these web pages where you will in the near future find up-to-date information on the treatment and research of clubfoot also in English.

Our activities are continuously being developed. The clubfoot patients and their parents have a big opportunity to impact them. We are hoping to get active members who for their part would like to contribute to the treatment and future views of children with clubfeet. We would also like to get more stories and experiences of adults with clubfeet to be published (namelessly) on our web pages.

The Finnish Clubfoot Society is a member society of the Finnish Association of People with Physical Disabilities.

IN MEMORIAM IGNACIO PONSETI VIVES (03.06.1914-18.10.2009)

Ignacio Ponseti died at the age of 95 years on the 18th of October 2009 in Iowa City. There is almost no other doctor who has lived such a colorful live than Ignacio Ponseti - one of the most famous and eldest orthopaedic surgeons in the world. Ignacio was born as a watchmaker's son in Ciutadella de Menorca in 1914, went to the university of Barcelona at the age of 15 years and almost became a mathematician. Ignacios way led after graduating from the Medical School in 1936 to the front of the Spanish Civil War, where he successfully treated wounded and helped them to escape to France. Ignacio travelled after the war from France to Mexico, where he served as the only doctor in a place called Juchitepec until he managed to save the money fro the immigration to the US in 1941. He got an orthopaedic recidency at the University of Iowa the famous orthopaedic professor Arthur Steindler as his chief. Before that he had to learn English by himself - and that gentle Catalanaccent became familiar in over 60 years to thousands of colleagues and families with clubfoot children all over the world.
Ignacio Ponseti was an excellent clinician and scientist in orthopaedics and especially in pediatric orthopaedics. His works about e.g. scoliosis, Perthes disease, hip dysplasia and clubfoot have been referred continuously. Ignacio visited in 1966 with the help of a Commonwelth scholarship European orthopaedic clinics - also in Finland. Ignacio retired from his position as the Professor of Ortopedics at the University of Iowa in 1984, but he returned to work to see the clubfoot patients after discovering that his work was not finished yet.
Ignacios most important and famous achievement is without any doubts the Ponseti method to treat clubfeet in with approximately 5 weekly serial plaster castings and with a foot abduction bar until the age of 4 years without any major operations. His article about the treatment of congenital clubfoot in 1963 was misunderstood and it was until Dr. John Herzenberg, a famous doctor treating limb deformities, made efforts to inform colleagues about the method in the US that the method gained publicity all over the world. Ignacio Ponseti published his book "Congenital Clubfoot: Fundamentals of Treatment" in 1996. Ponseti method changed the whole thinking about congenital foot deformities and their treatment. Ponseti method could be referred as the invention of the polio vaccine. Hundreds of physicians and physiotherapists visited Ignacio every year in order to learn the method right. Ponseti method has now been accepted all over the world and it is the most effective, fastest, most low-cost and easiest way to treat clubfeet anywhere in the world. The Ponseti method has been named as one of the success stories and major achievements of the Bone and Joint Decade.
Ignacio gained almost all prizes and honours of the orthopaedic world during his career and many wished him to get the Nobel prize. He also knew personally all the most famous orthopedic surgeons in the world - also Prof. Anders Langenskiöld in Finland. Ignacio's wife, Prof. Helena Percas-Ponseti published his memoirs "Homage to Iowa" in 2008. The inventor of the gentle way to treat clubfeet was himself gentle, human and humorous.
Ignaciom kept on teaching doctors from all over the world till the very end until he got a stroke just before the beginning of an international Ponseti meeting. Among Ignacio's family - this beloved miracle maker - as Ignacio also was called - is missed by vast amount of colleagues and families with clubfoot children -also in Finland. Ignacios work goes on and is lead by Associate Prof. Jose Morcuende, the president of the Ponseti International Association, and all members of the Ponseti Clubfoot Treatment.