Preoperative simulation system for the ZCHW custom hip prosthesis and its usage through the internet

The ZCHW custom hip prosthesis has been developed at the Department of Biomedical Engineering, University Collage London, by Peter Walker and colleagues since 1988. About 3000 cases have been performed under the name of CAD-CAM hip in the U.K., with very good results. We have been joining in the project since 1990, and 19 cases have been done since 1995 when the Japanese Ministry of Health and Welfare issued permission for its usage. A 3-D preoperative simulation system was developed to determine if there were problems, and the system was refined so as to be able to use it over the Internet. In this article, the results of these cases and the utility of the preoperative simulation system are presented