For nearly three decades, Jeffrey Deren, MD, an orthopedic surgeon at Orlando (Fla.) Health Jewett Orthopedic Institute, has treated the same quiet complication of hand injuries: the splint that was supposed to help.
Patients would arrive at his clinic days after an emergency department visit, wrists immobilized but hands stiff, swollen or positioned awkwardly. Sometimes the splint was too tight. Sometimes it was loose. Often, it held the hand in the wrong position entirely.
The result, Dr. Deren said, was that recovery sometimes began at a disadvantage…