Undergrad and Radcliffe Fellow bond over bone replacement
Last year, while walking through campus, Linh Nam ’20 felt something in her leg buckle. A survivor of osteosarcoma, the most common type of bone cancer, she had a bone graft to save her knee when she was 10 years old; now, just 10 years later, the metal plate meant to reinforce the new bone had failed due to years of bearing her weight. Nam was offered two choices: try another bone graft — this time vascularized, or infused with her own blood vessels, to further encourage bone growth — or undergo a total knee replacement. “The doctor said the knee replacement would have to be repeated every 10 years,” Nam says. “If I lived to be 80, I’d need seven of them.” She has already had 10 surgeries since her diagnosis due to complications. She opted for a new graft with bone harvested from her tibia — the last chance at salvaging...