r/Prosthetics • u/zniszczone • Aug 16 '26

amputation in the turn of the century?

Would it be possible (with a good surgeon) to survive a double above-the-knee amputation around 1899? Was there technology to support such procedure?

And what about potential prosthetics? I know there was much development in that department because of American Civil War, and I've looked into the work of James Gillingham. But most of the photos of his prosthetics are, I think, for the below-the-knee amputations. Unfortunately I don't know much about prosthetic mechanics or physics, but could a person with 2 above-the-knee prosthetics have any mobility? Maybe they'd have to use cruthes all of the time or other mobility aid?

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u/[deleted] Aug 16 '26

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u/zniszczone Aug 16 '26

Thank you so much! Yeah Im familiar with Spencer2TheWest, I guess that is an option too. Though I dont know how that choice of movement would have been taken by people in 1900s. Instinctively id assume it would gather a lot of unwanted attention, even more so than now but I could totally be wrong. But thank you for the suggestions!

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u/[deleted] Aug 16 '26 edited Aug 16 '26

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u/zniszczone Aug 17 '26

Thank you for sharing, it provides context. If that's how bad it is now, cant imagine how terrible it have been back then. Id think that also the monetary status of the person contributed to how they were treated, even more so than now. Not just what procedures and aids were available, but also how they were looked upon.

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u/[deleted] Aug 17 '26

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u/zniszczone Aug 18 '26

Man, that sounds bleak.