Rotationplasty

A 15-year-old male presented with a very large osteosarcoma of the distal femur (left panel) with major posteriorly placed soft tissue mass. The patient was treated by a turnabout procedure (rotationplasty) where the distal half of the femur was resected, and replaced by the tibia but "turned around" so that the foot was pointing backwards (right panel). Using this system, the ankle joint now served as a knee joint, and the patient uses a special prosthesis to use the new knee joint (formerly the ankle) to flex and extend.