Dynamic Elbow Extension Splint

I’m not going to lie, I was kind of proud of myself with this one. I had no idea how I was going to pull this off, even as I was making it. This is an elbow extension splint that I made for a 12 year old girl with Cerebral Palsy: hemiplegia. She was lacking 40 degrees of elbow extension. I had tried to teach her stretches to do on her own, but her understanding of the task was limited and there was not great follow through with the family. I could have done a static elbow extension splint, but I really wanted to be able to give a progressive stretch. We don’t have the funding to buy something like this out of a catalogue, so I decided to try to make it myself.

I used 1/8” Aquaplast for the upper arm and forearm. I folded the Aquaplast on top of itself for extra stability to make the bars. I used socket screws for rivets and covered up the back of the flat bolt with Sugru (a self-curing rubber/silicone) in order to avoid any rough edges near the arm. Additionally, she postures her arm in shoulder internal rotation. I was concerned about possible pressure points and/or rubbing that could cause redness. I cut that side down as much as I could without hindering the integrity of it, and then I covered it in Sugru. I attached the bars by punching holes through the bars and the base and forming a rivet out of Aquaplast pellets. I then formed two cylinders out of the Aquaplast. One of them I formed around a long screw, the other one I left open. I used a heat gun to attach each cylinder to the upper arm and forearm pieces. The end of the screw is inserted into the hole of the cylinder on the forearm. As she stretches, the wing nut can be twisted to push the elbow into further extension, and voila!