@earlaexander I was at Mayo just for the surgery for a bad ankle fracture, and 2 weeks later to get a hard cast, then 4 weeks later to get that removed. I didn't go through any bone shaping procedures for my leg. I did see a patient at Mayo with a fixator around his lower leg that was undergoing some bone modifications. Right after my injury, I had an external fixator screwed into my tibia and ankle to stabilize it before I had surgery to repair the ankle that was put on where they took me after the injury. They just cleaned and closed the wounds and didn't try to fix the bones yet because they were expecting a lot of swelling. It was a difficult thing to live with having a cage screwed to my bones and I just lived with that for a bit over 2 weeks. I learned about these procedures because I was reading about my surgeon. I am doing some work right now with my dentist who is expanding my upper and lower jaw and I turn a screw on the appliance that I wear in my mouth. It works similar to the fixators and a patient turns a screw to apply pressure to move or expand the bone. Bones modify themselves from pressure, and turning the screw keeps adding pressure in small steps.

As for Mayo, you don't know until you try. You do have to have insurance that they would take. One thing that would be in your favor is that places that provide this type of bone regeneration are very limited or few and far between. You probably can't find a hospital doing this in many places, and if you have a need for this to avoid disability, who knows?

My non weight bearing was the typical schedule for healing a broken ankle. After the hard cast came off at 6 weeks past the injury, I started partial weight bearing in small steps. My fixator was not changing my bone, just stabilizing it before I had internal fixation surgery. If you were doing some bone modification with external fixation, you'd have to ask the surgeon about what to expect and how long, etc. Sometimes they slice through a bone and graft it with corrections and sometimes they add a bone graft into it. Your bone density may make a difference on what is possible. Thinner bone density may change the game. You may want to print the article and take that to your appointment. I would be interested in hearing what your doctor thought about this approach.

Good luck!
Jennifer