Longtime patient credits Shriners for saving his leg

When Spokane Valley resident Devin Hannas heard that Spokane Shriners Hospital for Children was slotted for potential closure, it took him back to the 16 years he spent as a patient of the hospital.

Devin was born with a deformed hip joint and disfigured femur in his right leg. The only option doctors gave his parents was “to amputate my lower leg.”

Devin’s father, Wayne Hannas, recalls how he felt when given the prognosis: they were “devastated.” Devin’s foot and ankle were perfectly normal. “There was no way we could let them cut it off.”

Devin’s mother, Cheryl Knoll, adds, “I felt helpless, but I knew deep down inside of me that there was something that could be done.”

The perfectly normal ankle and foot gave Devin’s parents hope and they began to seek other opinions. They went to Seattle. But, as Devin recalls, “the big hospitals in Seattle had nothing to offer.”

Then a friend of Devin’s father, Harold Shepard, a Shriner from Pomeroy, Wash., suggested Spokane Shriners Hospital for Children. Unlike other hospitals in the region, Shriners offered an innovative way of lengthening limbs known as the Ilizarov technique.

Invented in Siberia in the 1950s by Russian surgeon Gavril Abramovich Ilizarov, the technique involved breaking the bone and pulling it apart to heal and lengthen in between. The apparatus used to hold the bones in place is similar to traction for patients with broken necks. Screws and pins coming through a cylinder suspend the bones while they grew back together.

Devin would wear the Ilizarov apparatus several times during his treatment. The bulky contraption proved difficult during the everyday activities of a student. “It was so bad I couldn’t even ride the school bus,” he said. Once at school his leg was at odds with the small desks. He would require two desks; one to sit sideways in and one to lean his leg on.

At 6 he started the 16-year process of lengthening his right leg. His first two surgeries were bone grafts to correct his deformed hip joint.

In the seventh grade he spent nine months wearing the Ilizarov apparatus and gained 2.5 inches of length. But he broke his leg while running and spent six weeks in a body cast. Though unable to attend his middle school, he attended school at Shriners and re-entered eighth grade on track as a result.

This would not be the last break. In 10th grade he gained 2 inches more from the apparatus and subsequently suffered another break. Rather than an uncomfortable body cast, this time they attached a plate with 13 screws to stabilize the femur.

Shortly after that the leg got infected with staph. Devin recalls, “The infection never bothered me.” What did bother him was “the fear that you were going to lose the leg if you don’t get rid of it.” But the antibiotics worked.

Devin says his parents and the doctors left the decisions up to him. “It was always left up to me whether I wanted to lengthen it any more.”

He decided to lengthen the tibia next. He gained 2 inches more in length and suffered another break upon taking the apparatus off. To stabilize it they attached a 7-inch plate, which led to what he recalls as one of his more painful surgeries, in which they cut zigzags throughout the Achilles tendon to enhance its flexibility.

Sixteen years and 23 leg surgeries later, his leg is now 6 1/2 inches longer than it was and only three-quarters of an inch shorter than the right leg. Despite all the pain, Devin says, “I’m glad that I have my own leg. It seems normal to have my leg.”

Today he walks with a slight limp. “I’m not going to be a track star,” he says, but he leads an active lifestyle and enjoys camping, riding motorcycles and working two jobs that require him to be on his feet constantly. He works in a warehouse and a convenience store.

When asked what Spokane Shriners Hospital for Children means to him, Devin has difficulty finding adequate words. “It means so much. There is nothing to say to describe having your limbs. If it wasn’t for them I probably wouldn’t.”

Shriners hospital is safe from imminent closure, but according to Chief Rabban of the El Katif Shrine, Von Chimienti, who attended the recent board meeting in San Antonio, it could be considered for closure again as early as next year.

Devin Hannas hopes it stays in Spokane forever. “It would be tragic if people like me weren’t able to get that kind of care.”