Congressional Leaders Urge HHS Secretary to Approve Coding for Advanced Lower Limb Prosthetic Device, Smart Pyramid™

OKLAHOMA CITY, May 3, 2011 /PRNewswire/ -- House Appropriations Committee Ranking Member Congressman Norm Dicks, along with House Armed Services Committee Ranking Member Congressman Adam Smith, senior House Ways and Means Committee member Congressman Jim McDermott, and Energy and Commerce Committee member Congressman Jay Inslee, sent a letter late on Friday to Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius urging the Department to approve coding for Orthocare Innovations' Smart Pyramid™ prosthetic device. Smart Pyramid™ is an advanced prosthetic device that analyzes forces in a prosthesis and recommends changes to prosthetic components to reduce injurious forces that typically result in skin breakdown, back pain, joint pain, osteoarthritis, and falls among prosthesis users.

Members writing to Secretary Sebelius communicated support by indicating that "... Smart Pyramid™ enables practitioners to assess prosthetic function and minimize the negative effects of suboptimal alignment, such as loss of balance, patient pain, and other safety risks. This data has the potential to reduce prosthetic misalignment and fit issues, allowing higher levels of activity, reduced morbidity, and cost savings from avoided refitting, socket replacements and preventing or mitigating secondary complications."

This communication follows on a prior bipartisan letter of support led by Senator James Inhofe, a senior Member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, along with Republican Tom Cole of the House Budget and Appropriations Committees and Dan Boren of the House Committee on Armed Services Committee, expressing their support for a unique HCPCS code for Smart Pyramid™. In this letter, members communicated Smart Pyramid's™ benefits: "In addition to limiting unnecessary pain related to skin breakdown, osteoarthritis, walking instability and muscle activity, this device can result in medical cost savings for both the patient and Medicare as these complications are eliminated."

Currently, the fit of a prosthesis to the amputee's residual limb is attained by subjective trial and error, without the aid of objective measurement or data. Many amputees have phantom-limb pain and reduced tissue sensitivity, reducing their ability to sense or convey sub-optimal function to clinicians for correction. This combination of factors commonly results in the prosthetic socket applying unbalanced, and even injurious, forces to the residual limb. Use of the Smart Pyramid™ solves these problems, enabling this vulnerable patient population to achieve normal and necessary function.

Smart Pyramid™ was developed under competitive, Small Business Innovations Research awards from the National Institutes of Health.

About Orthocare Innovations, LLC

Orthocare Innovations is a medical device research and product development company focused on bringing to market advanced, innovative technologies to improve clinical efficiency and enhance the quality of patient care services in the rehabilitation, prosthetic and orthotic markets. For more information, go to www.orthocareinnovations.com.

SOURCE Orthocare Innovations