Leg Lengthening Alternative for a Quick 1-2 Inch Gain (Seriously)

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Quote from: Antoine on August 15, 2020, 03:53:25 PMUntil this treatment is completed we should focus on this, I guess: http://www.limblengtheningforum.com/index.php?topic=4253.0

I still don’t understand why we haven’t a treatment like this to lengthen the spine. It would be the easiest and safest way to gain some height. We don’t even need to go through a real surgery, they just insert a needle in your back and fill the spinal discs with gel. As the site says, it is “a very simple surgical procedure. It only requires a small area of local anaesthesia. It does not require general anaesthesia or stressful medicinal complimentary therapy.“

I don't understand much, but that does sound dangerous to me.

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I’m not a doctor, but I think it isn’t as dangerous as it may seem. According to the site, “The disc compartment is punctured with a small hollow needle, monitored by x-ray. The very thin synthetic disc stick only a few millimetres long are then inserted through this needle. The correct position inside the disc is also monitored by x-ray. The typical procedure lasts about 10-20 minutes.”
I guess the real issue is: does this procedure really add millimeters of height to healthy discs?

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Quote from: Antoine on August 15, 2020, 09:56:03 PMI’m not a doctor, but I think it isn’t as dangerous as it may seem. According to the site, “The disc compartment is punctured with a small hollow needle, monitored by x-ray. The very thin synthetic disc stick only a few millimetres long are then inserted through this needle. The correct position inside the disc is also monitored by x-ray. The typical procedure lasts about 10-20 minutes.”
I guess the real issue is: does this procedure really add millimeters of height to healthy discs?

I actually did a ton of research on this. Not an expert, but here's my 2c

These injection treatments are designed to restore vertebral height lost from degenerative disk disease (DDD). At best, this is a couple millimeters and is typically done to affected disks only. For obvious reasons, there isn't any research (as far as I could find) about what happens if you reverse intervertebral disk height (IDH) loss beyond the original loss amount. What little I could find however, seemed to indicate that expanding IDH beyond original levels increased the risk of future DDD in adjacent sections due to mechanical changes in the distribution of stress and pressure along the spine. Additionally, it seemed that expanding IDH beyond original height increased the risk of disk herniation (basically disk popping and oozing, super painful) due to increased outward pressure on the walls of the disk.

So theoretically, yes, you can add a few mm to each disk along the entire length of the spine. At best, you are looking at a half inch to an inch of improvement in exchange for increased herniation risk for all disks of the spine, with risk compounding with each disk you "inflate".

If you have access to regular monitoring to determine the health of the disk walls and stress distribution along the spine, it might be viable. But I don't see any surgeon okaying this lol, at least not in the US.

The only way I could really find that could work is very costly and experimental. You'd basically have to undergo targeted disk replacement/fusion. Finding vertebrae along the thoracic portion where changes would result in the smallest load effect. You would remove the disk and replace it with a bone graft and a specially made distraction device. Over a fairly short period, you would distract the desired/safe length and then the two vertebrae would fuse. The additional space added through distraction = total height gained.

I had some concerns regarding the stretching of nerves, but I found a NASA study on astronauts spinal health during long term missions where their spines would lengthen/decompress up to 2-3 inches. The study explored back pain experienced by astronauts when they returned to Earth. In all cases, the back pain was the result of back muscle atrophy, not nerve issues. As far as I could tell, the spinal nerve was more than able to stretch for long periods of time with seemingly no adverse effect on the astronaut. That said, I couldn't find any research about what happens if you isolate the stretch along a small portion of the spinal nerve. (For example, stretching 2-3 inches between 3 adjacent vertebrae instead of 2-3 inches along the whole spine).

Review of questions that need to be answered/researched:
1. What would be the effect of basically adding an extra 1-3 inches between the T12/L1 vertebrae?
2. How would back muscles and spinal ligaments adjust? Could they adjust? (Especially concerned about ligaments, they're not meant to stretch very far)
3. How much mobility is lost through the process? I've read about T12/L1 area fusion and it seems like athletes are generally able to return to normal function. Issues really only start if you're messing with the lower vertebrae.
4. Can the spinal cord and nerves stretch that distance? (I think the cord would just move further along the sleeve, but that still leaves the nerves)
5. Facet joints will need to be fused as well.
6. Take questions 1-5 and apply them to the cervical spine.
7. How to design the device?
8. How to fund a device?
9. How, who, and where could this treatment possibly be tried? 

So in summary this treatment is technically possible. Portions of the proposed solution have already been tried and tested in a mix of different DDD treatments. It would be a question of combining some techniques and prototyping a new device. Essentially a spine version of the Stryde nail.

But it's a high-risk, fringe treatment with limited ROI potential for doctors and device manufacturers. The only hope for this is, in my eyes, is a very wealthy person with height neurosis decides to undergo the process of R&D, testing, and treatment, be it here in the states, or maybe in a place like China.

Anyways, this turned out a lot longer than I thought lol, got carried away. But I will do a follow-up or edit with citations with relevant studies if I have the time and/or people have the interest. Would love to continue to explore this with other interest "researchers" as a nice quarantine side project if anyone is interested! #Shorttorsogang

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Thanks ThickButt, you’re so inspiring! I really appreciated what you wrote. Let us know if you find something else.
In the meanwhile, I’d like to draw your attention to this: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/20615252/.
It says that non-surgical spinal decompression increased the height of lumbar degenerated discs from 7.5 mm to 8.8 mm (1.3 mm increase).
If by hypothesis similar results could be achieved also for non-degenerated discs in the entire spine, people could grow at least 1 inch repeating non-surgical decompression treatment every day, don’t you think? (1.3 mm x 23 discs = 3 cm)
I think that expanding intervertebral disc height in this way shouldn’t lead to spine problems because it would be something similar to what happens to astronauts.
It’s just an hypothesis, but I think that it is a field that must be explored since it could bring safely to a small but effective height gain (at least 1 inch, I guess).

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Quote from: Antoine on August 17, 2020, 03:27:42 PMThanks ThickButt, you’re so inspiring! I really appreciated what you wrote. Let us know if you find something else.
In the meanwhile, I’d like to draw your attention to this: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/20615252/.
It says that non-surgical spinal decompression increased the height of lumbar degenerated discs from 7.5 mm to 8.8 mm (1.3 mm increase).
If by hypothesis similar results could be achieved also for non-degenerated discs in the entire spine, people could grow at least 1 inch repeating non-surgical decompression treatment every day, don’t you think? (1.3 mm x 23 discs = 3 cm)
I think that expanding intervertebral disc height in this way shouldn’t lead to spine problems because it would be something similar to what happens to astronauts.
It’s just an hypothesis, but I think that it is a field that must be explored since it could bring safely to a small but effective height gain (at least 1 inch, I guess).

Thanks haha, I'm glad you enjoyed it. I'm totally obsessed with the concept of torso lengthening. It's kinda the holy grail for me. And sure thing, will continue to share!

Regarding the study you linked - something you have to keep in mind is any increases they talk about are restorative, as in they are just bringing the disks back to their original height. There is little to no added stress on the exterior disk membrane.

Think of the disks like gel filled balloons. Disk degeneration represents a deflating of a balloon over time. The injection treatment pumps gel back into the balloon and brings it back closer to its original level of inflation. However, like a balloon, if you inflate too much you run the risk of a pop or rupture. When you experience a herniation it can result in pinched nerves which are no joke. They are immensely painful and have a cascading effect of causing pain and lack of function along any limb or extremity that leads away from the pinch location. Through multi-vertebral injection therapy you are increasing this risk along the entire spine. And the thing about the spine is once one portion is compromised, the rest of the spine has to compensate leading to more stress and more ruptures. The effect compounds each time.

In addition to outward pressure from gel over-inflation, you must also remember the top and down compressive forces acting on the disk from the adjacent vertebrae. So think of the overinflated balloon now being squeezed on both ends by too books. If it wasn't going to pop before, the risk has now increased dramatically. With day to day activities you might be fine, but if you had a high fall or needed to carry something heavy, the increased pressure might be enough to cause a pop(s). Bear in mind, disk herniation occurs frequently irl on people with normal, unmodified disks. Under the proposed treatment, I think your day to day activities would be quite limited.

Lastly, we must also remember the facet joints on the rear of the spine. These joints are very precisely positioned and help stabilize the movement of adjacent vertebrae relative to each other. I will try finding the study, but I remember reading that an over-inflation of the vertebral disc of even a few cm dramatically changed the ability of the facet joints to function correctly (in the negative direction). I'm not great at explaining, but if you look up videos explaining facet joints and their function you will see why this is an important thing to consider.

This is why if you read Dr. Hynes proposed treatment, he mentions only targeting isolated portions of the spine as opposed to attempting treatment along the length of the entirety of the back. He finds the vertebrae where modification would result in the least bio-mechanical effect and thereby allows for more realistic management of potential dangers. 

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Thank you very much, you are really clear and experienced. I’ll PM you to ask you a little question.

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Quote from: Antoine on August 17, 2020, 07:52:14 PMThank you very much, you are really clear and experienced. I’ll PM you to ask you a little question.

No problem! Again, I'm no expert, but I'm glad you found the posts helpful.

Replied to your PM

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Quote from: ThickButt on August 17, 2020, 11:01:52 PMNo problem! Again, I'm no expert, but I'm glad you found the posts helpful.

Replied to your PM

Yes, really helpful. Thank you!

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What do you guys think about this

http://med.stanford.edu/news/all-news/2020/08/Researchers-find-method-to-regrow-cartilage-in-the-joints.html

Could they possibly "overgrow" the joint size by adding cartilage volume? Hence result in a total greater leg length?

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Quote from: O_99 on August 19, 2020, 10:01:50 AMWhat do you guys think about this

http://med.stanford.edu/news/all-news/2020/08/Researchers-find-method-to-regrow-cartilage-in-the-joints.html

Could they possibly "overgrow" the joint size by adding cartilage volume? Hence result in a total greater leg length?

I guess something like this could be possibile. We’re talking about it here:
http://www.limblengtheningforum.com/index.php?PHPSESSID=j52cp6kmn6s6i7rjfb5fc0kto5&topic=65416.msg177869;topicseen#msg177869