WO1997049362A1

WO1997049362A1 - Orthopedic fixation tape

Info

Publication number: WO1997049362A1
Application number: PCT/KR1996/000098
Authority: WO
Inventors: Sung-Ki Kang
Original assignee: Kang Sung Ki
Priority date: 1996-06-27
Filing date: 1996-06-27
Publication date: 1997-12-31
Also published as: AU6139596A

Abstract

An orthopedic fixation tape used for wearing an orthopedic cast or gips and easily and simply produced with low cost is disclosed. The orthopedic fixation tape is produced by soaking a milky, blue or pink tape, which was produced by longitudinally weaving 100 % polyester filament sewing yarns as the warps and wefts, in polyurethane resins. The content of the polyurethane resins in the woven fixation tape is 41.7 ± 5 % per 1 m of tape. The fixation tape is also soaked in water of 24-30 °C thereby being hardened. According to the above fixation tape, is it possible to X-ray and bathe a part of the body in the cast. The above cast also has good ventilation, alleviates itching of the body part in the cast and is convenient to patients.

Description

ORTHOPEDIC FIXATION TAPE

Technical Field

The present invention relates in general to an orthopedic fixation tape used for wearing an orthopedic cast or gips that is a rigid dressing used to immobilize a part of the body and, more particularly, to an improvement in the material of the orthopedic fixation tape and the process for producing such a tape.

Background Art

In order to wear an orthopedic cast or gips for immobilizing a part of the body in the prior art, a bandage is wound around the part of the body prior to applying plaster to the bandage for fixation of the bandage. However, the use of the bandage with the plaster as the orthopedic cast has a problem in that the plaster is easily abraded and leaves traces of plaster on color garments of patients and other people. In an effort to solve the above problem caused by the typical plaster cast, an orthopedic fixation tape formed of synthetic resin has been proposed as disclosed in, for example, U.S. Patent No. 4,774, 937, 4,502,479, 4,667,661, 4,609,578 or 4,433,680. However, the synthetic resin fixation tape disclosed in each of the above U.S patents must be produced through a complicated production process thus increasing the cost. Another problem of the above synthetic resin fixation tapes resides in that users must wear them with a limited use, so that the synthetic resin fixation tapes are inconvenient to the users. Disclosure of the Invention

It is, therefore, an object of the present invention to provide an orthopedic fixation tape in which the above problems can be overcome and which is easily and simply produced with low cost and is convenient to users.

In order to accomplish the above object, an orthopedic fixation tape in accordance with an embodiment of the present invention is produced with low cost by soaking a milky, blue or pink tape, which was produced by longitudinally weaving 100 % polyester filament sewing yarns (KS K 3602, No. 30) as the warps and wefts, in polyurethane resins.

Best Mode for Carrying Out the Invention

As well known to those skilled in the art, the polyester filament is a fiber filament made from a high molecular compound, preferably unsaturated polyester resin, that includes ester bond, resulting from a reaction of hydroxyl group and carboxyl group, as the main chain. The polyethylene terephthalate fiber is a polyester fiber that is made from a copolymer of terephthalic acid and ethylene glycol through a melt spinning process. The polyurethane resins are high molecular compounds including urethane bond, -NH CO O-. The chain polymer that is formed by the reaction of aliphatic polyisocyanate and tetramethylene glycol has a structure similar to that of polyamide. The above chain polymer has an excellent crystallinity, and a melting point lower than that of a corresponding polyamide. The chain polymer also is dissoluble in phenol, cresol or formic acid and has 65 % absorbency, 1 - 1.5 % humidity, excellent acid resistance and a specific weight higher than that of nylon.

The characteristics of polyester, which exert an effect on the characteristics of the polyurethane, may be changed in accordance with molecular weight, number of molecules, intermolecular distance, position of hydroxyl group, and structure of methylene group in polyol acid.

It has been noted that the polyester becomes a hard resin when it includes low molecular weight, more molecules, and higher value of hydroxyl group. On the contrary, the polyester becomes a soft and flexible resin when it includes high molecular weight, longer distance between molecules and low value of hydroxyl group.

In the present invention, the polyester filament sewing yarns for tape are not densely but sparsely woven, thereby providing lengthened intervals between the warps and wefts in the resulting woven tape. In addition, the resulting fixation tape must be free from shrinkage when stretching the tape longitudinally or transversely.

In the orthopedic fixation tape according to the present invention, the polyester filament tape is soaked in and thereby impregnated with polyurethane resins, so that the tape can be free from longitudinal or transverse shrinkage. In addition, the above fixation tape after wearing a cast allows ventilation relative to a part of the body in the cast.

In order to wear the above orthopedic cast using the fixation tape according to the present invention, cotton or gauze is wound around a part of the body to be immobilized prior to wearing the cast using the fixation tape. Before wearing of the cast, the fixation tape of this invention is soaked in warm water of, for example, 24 - 30 °C, for about 3 seconds. The wet tape then removed from the warm water in turn is wrung once or twice to squeeze water from the tape. It must be noted that the tape will more quickly harden when it is more strongly wrung to squeeze much water from the tape. When the fixation tape is soaked in excessively hot water, the hardening velocity of the tape may be reduced and thereby exert an operational difficulty while wearing the cast. That is, the orthopedic cast using the fixation tape of this invention must be completely worn around a part of the body within 5 minutes, must be hardened within 10 minutes, and must resist its own weight after 30 minutes elapsed. It is preferred to wind the fixation tape about threefold around the part of the body. On the other hand, the fixation tape is preferably wound four or five folds around a joint part of the body, for example, a part about a knee that must be repeatedly bent while walking with the cast.

In accordance with the orthopedic cast using the fixation tape of this invention, it is possible to X-ray and bathe a part of the body in the cast. The above cast also has good ventilation, alleviates itching of the body part in the cast and is convenient to patients.

While the invention will be described in connection with Example and Sample Tests, it will be understood that we do not intend to limit the invention to those Example and Sample Tests.

Example

Polyester filaments as the warps and wefts were woven into a woven tape with lengthened intervals between the warps and wefts of the resulting tape. The resulting polyester filament tape was soaked in polyurethane resins, thus being impregnated with the resins of the content of 41.7 ± 5 % per 1 m of the tape (380.9 g) . The tape impregnated with the polyurethane resins in turn was wound around a reel prior to packaging.

Sample Test 1

The tape obtained from the above Example was laid on a flat panel in a way such that the tape was free from both unnatural wrinkles and outside tensile forces. Thereafter, the central axis length and average width of the tape on the flat panel were measured. In this case, the average width of the tape was measured by measuring the widths of three different portions of the tape prior to averaging the measured widths.

After measuring the weight of the tape, the tape was soaked in DMF(N,N-dimethylformamide)solution for 2 hours. Thereafter, the weight of the polyester filaments with the polyurethane resins was measured to measure the weight % of the polyurethane resins as the hardener of the tape. Thus, the content of the polyurethane resins in the tape was measured.

Sample Test 2

The tape obtained from the above Example was soaked in warm water of 24 °C for 3 seconds. The wet tape then removed from the warm water in turn was wrung three times to squeeze water from the tape. After wringing, the tape was wound five folds around a cylindrical column, first wound with waxy paper and having a diameter of 70 mm, without applying any tensile force to the tape while winding, thus hardening the tape into an orthopedic cast. After hardening, the wound tape or the cast was removed from the column, thus preparing three cast samples. The resulting cast samples were left at 90 "C for 2 hours and in turn left at room temperature for 2 hours prior to measuring the compressive strength and lateral (flat) strength of the cast. The tensile (crushing) strength of a cast sample was measured as follows. The tensile (crushing) force of a twofold cast sample of 25 mm (S) x 100 mm (L) was measured with a tensile tester. The measuring results are given in Table.

Table

Sample Compressive Lateral (flat) Tensile(crushing)

No. Strength Strength Strength

Size(mm) Size(mm) Kg Size(mm) Kg Size(mm) Kg

70mm(D) x 283 70mm(D)x 13.0 25mm(S)x 100

1 50mm(L); ±10 50mm(L); ±3 100mm(L); ±10

(50x3600) 5 folds 5 folds 2 folds

70mm(D) x 212 70mm(D)x 19.5 25mm(S)x 100

2 75mm(L); ±10 75mm(L); ±3 100mm(L) ; ±10

(75x3600) 5 folds 5 folds 2 folds

70mm(D) x 159 70mm(D)x 26.0 25mm(S)x 100

3 100mm(L); ±10 100mm(L); ±3 100mm(L); ±10

(100x3600) 5 folds 5 folds 2 folds

70mm(D) x 119 70mm(D)x 32.5 25mm(S)x 100

4 125mm(L); ±10 125mm(L); ±3 100mm(L); ±10

(125x3600) 5 folds 5 folds 2 folds In the Table,

D : diameter of cylindrical column L : length of cylindrical column S : width of sample.

Test Conditions:

Compression strength : velocity = 10 mm/min

Lateral (flat)strength : velocity = 10 mm/min (reducing column diameter by 50 %) Tensile (crushing) strength : velocity = 10 mm/min load = 500 Kg

Industrial Applicability

The present invention provides an improved orthopedic fixation tape used for wearing an orthopedic cast or gips that is a rigid dressing used to immobilize a part of the body. The above fixation tape is produced with low cost by soaking a milky, blue or pink tape, produced by longitudinally weaving polyester filament sewing yarns as the warps and wefts, in polyurethane resins. In accordance with the orthopedic cast using the above fixation tape, it is possible to X-ray and bathe a part of the body in the cast. The above cast also has good ventilation, alleviates itching of the body part in the cast and is convenient to patients.

Claims

1. An orthopedic cast comprising: a woven fixation tape formed by weaving polyester filaments as the warps and wefts and being soaked in polyurethane resins for a predetermined time.

2. The orthopedic cast according to claim 1, wherein the content of said polyurethane resins in the woven fixation tape is 41.7 ± 5 % per 1 m of tape.

3. The orthopedic cast according to claim 1, wherein said fixation tape is soaked in water of 24 - 30 "C thereby being hardened.