Rancho Los Amigos Medical Center. A unique orthopaedic resource and teaching institution

Rancho Los Amigos Medical Center, initially a poor farm in the County of Los Angeles, CA became a world renown medical institution because of the polio epidemics in the 1950s. Responding to the need for day to day inpatient care were an overflow of victims of polio who had spine and extremity weakness and were dependent on respirators. Team care, developed at the institution, was used by Vernon L. Nickel, chief orthopaedic surgeon so that maximum use of the limited staff's efforts would be to take care of patients. This need spawned many innovative developments through clinical observations and trials, basic research, and engineering innovations that resulted in the patient's functional improvement and helped return many victims of polio to independence and to their communities. Subsequently, orthopaedic surgeons, Jacquelin Perry, and Alice Garrett joined the full-time staff as the workload increased. Stabilizing the spine using fascial supports, spinal fusion, spinal instrumentation, orthoses, and seating systems allowed those patients who were not totally dependent on respirators to be upright and mobilized. When polio was eradicated, newer programs were established for physically disabled persons with musculoskeletal disorders affecting the spine and extremities and for those patients with congenital, acquired, neurologic, and neuromuscular disorders. In formal graduate residency affiliations, fellowships, and continuing medical education programs orthopaedic surgeons from around the world have been taught the basic principles of "categorical care" for physically disabled people for 50 years. Orthopaedic care given through these programs formed the basis of a new orthopaedic subspecialty, Orthopaedic Rehabilitation.