Lonjezo Binton

Lonjezo lost his left leg below the knee when he was only 4, because he fell into a kitchen fire when he was helping his mum to cook. Lonjezo was rushed to Mchinji Hospital but unfortunately, the burns became infected and his leg had to be amputated. At the end of 2018, after his wounds had healed, Lonjezo was referred to 500 miles for his first prosthetic leg. As you can see the results were good!

Lonjezo’s parents could not afford to bring him back to 500 miles until May 2023 by which time the leg was obviously far too small for him. He was never-the-less still trying to use it which was causing him to walk abnormally, not to mention causing him considerable pain! The new leg that 500 miles made for him in May 2023 had additional metal jointed side bars to support Lonjezo’s knee and to try to improve his gait.

At that time, 500 miles connected Lonjezo with DIPD, one of 500 miles’ partners and, luckily for Lonjezo, now 10 years old, DIPD brough him back during the first QMS visit to our service at LION by the team from Strathclyde University. Together with our staff, Alana and Christine noticed that Lonjezo was now walking with a hyper-extended knee and agreed that he doesn’t need the jointed side bars but rather, simply a trans-tibial prosthesis with some built-in flexion and careful trimming at the knee to control the hyper extension. It worked out very well as you can see on our short YouTube video.

DIPD paid 25% of the cost of Lonjezo’s leg but One Smile covered the rest and Lonjezo will continue to need new legs.