Case history

Considering the severity of the accident that cost him his left hand, Keiron McCammon considers himself lucky just to be alive. McCammon enjoys active, some might say, extreme, sports, including paragliding, diving and snowboarding. In February 2006, he was paragliding in Colombia.

“When I was coming into land, I unfortunately didn’t see the power lines and was electrocuted,” he said.

After three surgeries in Colombia over five days, McCammon traveled back to Miami where he underwent another dozen surgeries. Finally, doctors determined that it wasn’t possible to save his hand. An amputation below the elbow was deemed the best option to speed his recovery. The decision freed him from months of painful procedures with a doubtful outcome.

“So to me, it was a sense of relief. I think for my wife as well,” he said. “We had had some certainty and then it was just a case of okay, now, it’s done. Let’s get back, get out of the hospital and get back to work.”

About two months after the accident, he was back home in the Bay area of California. It was the loving support of his wife, as well as friends and business associates that let him focus on what was important to him and move on. A month after coming home, he was back at work as one of the founders of a busy internet start-up, motivated by the fact that the company was in the midst of a big product launch.

His accident didn’t dissuade him from continuing with his active lifestyle. He continues to scuba dive, work out at the gym and practice yoga, using a different passive prosthetic device for each activity. When he plays the guitar, he wears an attachment into which he can screw a plectrum. He documents his experiences in a candid blog at www.onehandedblogger.com.

At some point in the recovery process, he said he realized “this is it, this happened, it doesn’t fundamentally change who I am. Let’s just get on with life. Nothing was going to stop me, with or without an artificial limb.”

While he found ways to adapt and use specialized prosthetics for his various activities, he never warmed up to a traditional hook device with shoulder harness, finding it awkward, clumsy and a strain on his back when sitting at a desk. Nor did he use a traditional myoelectric device. Instead, his own research into what options were available led him to Touch Bionics and the i-LIMB Hand before the device even hit the market.

“I became pretty determined at that point that I would get an i-LIMB Hand,” he said.

McCammon acquired his i-LIMB Hand in late 2007 and has since been experimenting with his prosthetist to develop the ideal socket.

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