Look at Ronnie Sitton today and you see a happy and active 5’10”, 200 lb. teenager.

 

You would never know he spent two years suffering from the effects of a pedestrian-vehicle accident. Or that he still has nightmares. “I don’t have as many as I used to,” says Ronnie, “but I still wake up sometimes and think I’m dead. But then I quickly realize I’m not.”

 

Hit by a car in the summer of 2004, Ronnie was sent flying over the hood of the vehicle, where he landed in the road, broken and bruised.

 

Rushed to a nearby hospital, surgical fixation to repair shattered femurs in both legs left him immobile for three months and on crutches for six. While his right leg healed, his left leg started to swell.

 

Searching for answers

“Ronnie had had numerous scans and no one was able to determine what was going on with his leg,” remembers his mother, Madlyn Sitton.  “I knew something was wrong and I knew I had to find an answer. I sorted through 200 names until I found Dr. Weiner.”

 

Orthopedic Surgeon Lon S.Weiner, M.D., Section Chief, Orthopedic Trauma, Lenox Hill Hospital (Manhattan, New York, USA), had no idea just how grave the situation was until he saw the leg. 

 

“By the time I saw him, nearly a year and a half post surgery, I knew we had just a matter of time to reverse a potentially tragic outcome,” says Dr. Weiner. “Ronnie had no knee mobility. His left leg was twice as big as the other.”

 

The what and the where

Dr. Weiner referred Ronnie to Stephen C. Scharf, M.D., Chief of Nuclear Medicine, Lenox Hill Hospital who performed a gallium study using the new Philips Precedence SPECT/CT  system.  With this special ‘hybrid’ imaging system doctors can ‘fuse’ two different types of images together to see more than either image alone.

 

Dr. Scharf immediately discovered an abnormality in the leg. 

 

The SPECT (single photon emission computed tomography) portion of the scan confirmed a soft tissue infection, and the CT (computed tomography) portion determined its exact location. 

 

Dr. Scharf recalls, “We eliminated the ‘maybes’ by fusing the two images – by connecting the what with the where. In this case, the SPECT/CT scan showed infection in the screws with soft tissue infection in the lateral part of the thigh.”

 

Images guide the way

Armed with images that gave a clear understanding of the problem, Dr. Weiner was able to perform surgery to save Ronnie’s leg. 

 

“Rather than moving blindly about, I referred to the SPECT/CT scan and was able to remove the infected plates and screws in his leg and clean out the abscess within the pins — without disturbing the knee,” says Dr. Weiner.

 

“There are only a handful of scanners that can pick up infection specifically hiding behind steel plates and under screws.

 

The best possible outcome

Today Ronnie, is not only walking, but is also back on his skateboard.

 

“Folks kept telling me how lucky I was to have survived the accident with just two broken legs. But the lucky part was having my mom with me — she never left my side and never let me give up.”

Mrs. Sitton shudders to think of the ‘what ifs?’ and credits Dr. Weiner, Dr. Scharf and Philips for saving her son’s life. 

 

“By the time we saw Dr. Weiner, Ronnie’s leg was really bad. Dr. Weiner told us that he had never seen anything like it. The fact that he knew Dr. Scharf and that Dr. Scharf had the technology to diagnose the problem ... it’s a miracle.”

 

“God was with him. He was a lucky kid,” says his mom.

 

- December 2007

 

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