SIGN Turns 25
For 25 years you have helped us provide healing surgery for more than 423,000 injured people in low- and middle-income countries. That averages out to 46 people receiving SIGN Surgery every day for the last 25 years.
This man from Indonesia inspired Dr. Zirkle to design, manufacture, and donate implants.
Throughout this year, we will be looking back at the people and events that have inspired this journey as a means to celebrate, to re-affirm our mission to create equality of fracture care throughout the world, and to guide our path for the next 25 years and beyond.
The Man In the Bed
SIGN Founder, Dr. Lewis G. Zirkle, became aware of medical needs in low-income countries while serving in the US Army in Vietnam. Upon starting his private orthopaedic practice, Dr. Zirkle spent one month each year teaching surgeons in Indonesia and collecting hospital equipment to send to them.
In 1996, upon returning to a hospital years after initial training, Dr. Zirkle found a patient with a fractured femur who had been lying in traction for three years. Dr. Zirkle questioned the doctors because he had taught them how to treat this man’s injuries. They responded that they did not have the proper equipment for surgery, and this man could not afford to purchase the implant he needed.
Vietnamese surgeons reviewed and tested the first SIGN Sets, and provided invaluable feedback.
In that moment, Dr. Zirkle realized that teaching surgical techniques was not enough. He also needed to supply surgeons with orthopaedic instruments and implants that were appropriate for their hospital settings.
Searching for Solutions
Dr. Zirkle tried to convince commercial implant companies to design a low-cost intramedullary implant system for use in low-income countries.
Many were intrigued by the idea but, as he says, “They would never say yes, and they would never say no.” In 1998, he presented the need to the founders of Acumed, Randy and Mary Huebner. They believed the project was worthwhile and offered to manufacture the first implants and instrument sets as a pilot. Dr. Zirkle took these first designs to Vietnam, where surgeons were pleased with the implants and suggested improvements.
SIGN Founded
Dr. Zirkle returned home after the successful trip and decided to start up his own non-profit medical device company to create and donate the needed instruments and implants.
His main goals were twofold. First, to manufacture devices that surgeons in low-income countries could use without the need for expensive equipment or even electricity in the operating room. Secondly, all the products must be donated, so that impoverished patients could afford the care they needed to recover from a bone fracture.
The vision to create equality of fracture care throughout the world was now in motion.
We hope you enjoy this journey back through SIGN’s history. As we move through 2024, there will be a historical highlight in each newsletter, bonus email messages, and social media posts. If there is something you are interested in learning more about, please email us at info@signfracturecare.org
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Discover more!
Throughout the year, remember your support of SIGN with background images for your computer or phone.
Discover events that shaped SIGN in a historical timeline.