A group of doctors and scientists in North Texas were able to successfully 3D-print a part of a human femur, often regarded as the strongest bone in the body, that is as strong and flexible as real bone.
Dr. Robert Weinschenk says that printed bones serve as a crucial health care tool, for both surgeons preparing for procedures, as well as education tools for patients on their anatomy and how their bone will be fixed during surgery.
He told the Dallas Morning News, "As an educational tool, we thought instead of showing them images [of their bones], they just hold up a model. We're finding that patients are appreciative of that."
Wei Li, an assistant professor of mechanical engineering at the University Texas at Dallas, says that eventually, we could even grow new bones with 3D printers, in lieu of traditional bone grafts.
"There's not much we don't know about a normal, native, untouched femur," Weinschenk said. "But there's always new innovations happening on the surgical side to make our implants better and last longer [or to] develop some new technique of something that we already have [to be] more minimally invasive or applied in a different way."
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