Technical textiles as a new route to enhance orthopedic casts' properties

Purpose The casts sector is an important sector for orthopaedic textile products. Plaster and plastics casts are widely used in hospitals, pharmacies and health care centers, but they are heavy, not washable and do not offer a suitable fixation for bone fractures (e.g. hand wrist), especially when operated under different swelling conditions. After decreasing of the swelling, the cast is in a hard form and the stabilization effect of the cast is insufficient due to the occurring of distance between the skin and the cast. The purpose of this paper is to develop a new pneumatic cast that depends on Polyvinylchlorid coated fabric as an outer layer, skin friendly internal layers, an air chamber, and metal braces. Design/methodology/approach For more comfort, the cast is anatomically formed and the internal layers are made of cotton‐viscose fabrics and Polyester spacer fabrics. The pressure on the injured part can be controlled by using a pneumatic structure. Findings The characteristics of the developed pneumatic cast are found to be: easy to use, comfortable, washable, and light weight. Originality/value The paper describes the development of a new pneumatic cast that can overcome the difficulties of cast fixation with the injured part of the body: an economic product, that should be easy to use, light weight, comfortable, skin friendly, water resistant, easy to clean, and affordable.