CAD-CAM prescription and design items of custom made medical footwear soles

Abstract

Custom made medical footwear is a prescription-based medical device. In order for the endproduct to achieve the expected therapeutic effects, several conditions have to be fulfilled, such as: diagnosis and assessment of pathology and establishing the treatment goals, knowledge of the prescription items and of those technical characteristics of the product that allow to achieve these goals, the existence of flexible technologies enabling the design and practical execution of the prescription in the shortest possible time in terms of economic efficiency. In the absence of these factors, achieving the goals of the conservative treatment is difficult and frequently leads to failure. The present article proposes a review of the prescription parameters of custom made medical footwear soles and presentation of CAD-CAM solutions for their design. For this purpose, some sole prescription parameters were transposed into a virtual model ready for execution on automatic milling machines. CAD-CAM technologies enable the flexibilization of the custom made footwear sole design and manufacture processes and reduces the waiting times of patients. The implementation of these technologies requires significant investments for their purchase and for training medical specialists and technicians involved in establishing and implementing the treatment.