A Device that Can Help Veteran Amputees Overcome Phantom Limb Pain

Chris Albert 00:00:00 (link to this point)

What's going on, ladies and gentlemen? This is Chris Albert with the Warrior Soul podcast, and this is not a regular episode. This is gonna be a new segment where I wanna just bring things to the veteran community that I think can really, really help. And today's guest is a biomedical engineer. Her name is Amira Idris, and she's created the TheraV Elix.

And what this is is a band that amputees can put around their stump that will help to alleviate phantom limb pain. Now I'm not an amputee. I have never gone through that. But from what I hear, these pains can be enormous. And there's a lot of our veteran brothers who are out there who have suffered amputations who are dealing with this pain every day.

Now we know in the past, the normal reaction to this has been to provide these veterans with drugs. And we know that some of the drugs that they've been put on like opiates, they can really wreck somebody's health. They cause massive amounts of addiction, they cause liver toxicity and people have huge problems in coming off of them on top of all the cognitive challenges that they create for the person using them. So what we want to do is we want to introduce Veterans to ideas and tools that can help us to reduce dependency on these types of drugs. I'm not gonna say that, you know, that they should never be prescribed because some people out there need them.

But we also know that doctors have been prescribing them like Tic Tacs, especially to the veteran community. There's so many veterans out there who are suffering from opiate addictions right now. We want to do everything we can to make sure that more people do not suffer from the same thing. So in this episode, I'm just gonna talk with Amira about this invention. And the reason why I wanted to bring her on is because she's looking to give this thing away to about 80 more veterans who have suffered amputations.

The reason why she wants to give it away is because she is trying to create stories around the invention, and show how much it can help people who have suffered amputations. So, basically, she's looking for around 80 veterans that she could provide the device with so that she can help them alleviate their pain and so that they can provide information back to her on how well the device is working. She's been trying to go through the VA, but they haven't been very good about giving her the ability to do so and to get this device into the hands of people who could help. So we decided to help her out and to bring her on to the show. So it's a real short conversation.

We'll get into it. I just wanna let you know quickly that this podcast is and always is brought to you by F Bomb. F Bomb nutrition makes amazing, delicious, healthy packets, portable packets of fats. Their awesome fuel packets contain some awesome tasting macadamia nut butter, along with coconut oil. They've also got other fat packets that they...

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And with that, let's get into this conversation with Amira Idris from TheraV to talk about the Elix and how it could help veterans suffering from amputations and phantom limb syndrome. What's going on, everybody? Welcome to the Warrior Soul podcast. And I've got a really special episode today that I believe could help a whole lot of veterans out there who have gone through amputations. And for those of you who don't know, if you lose a limb, you tend to go through a series of pains.

The brain still thinks that the limb is there and that pain can be quite debilitating for anybody going through it. And so. I have today on the podcast, Amira Idris and she's created the TheraV Elix and what's cool about this is it's a band that goes around the stump and it in turn, it alleviates pain. Now I'm not very smart here on this, so Amira is gonna illuminate you on these things. But Amira is trying to get these devices out to the veteran community.

And what she's been trying to do, she tried to go through the VA. As we all know, the VA, they'll put up some roadblocks whenever they can to to get veterans some some new things that can help their lives. So what we're going try and do today is try to help her out. We're going to have her explain the device. We're going to have her talk about how she came to the device, and we're going to try and get this into the hands of some veterans who absolutely could use it to their benefit.

So how you doing today, Amira?

Amira Idris 00:05:49 (link to this point)

I'm fine. Thank you. How are you?

Chris Albert 00:05:51 (link to this point)

Absolutely awesome. So first things first, you're a biomedical engineer. Can you tell us a little bit about what a biomedical engineer does?

Amira Idris 00:06:01 (link to this point)

Yeah, I mean, the reason I went into biomedical engineering was I wanted to go into the prosthetics field. So I wanted to make prosthesis. So biomedical engineers, they do a wide range of things. But the path I went through was trying to go into medical devices, basically. But as biomedical engineer, you could do research.

You could do a wide range of things. It's nothing really specifically that is biomedical engineering.

Chris Albert 00:06:28 (link to this point)

And why'd you choose this field?

Amira Idris 00:06:32 (link to this point)

The reason I went to this field was when I was growing up, I always wanted to be an engineer like my dad. But my dad's a civil engineer, so my dad builds roads. And I wanted to be robots. And mainly because one of my favorite childhood movies growing up was the movie Robocop. And I thought that, oh my goodness, if I go into this field, I'm going to get to build the future Robocops, you know, or the future Paralympians. And I thought that's what the amputee space was about. And so I wanted to go into that field. But when I went to college, and I worked at a prosthetic clinic, I found out that it really wasn't what I thought it was. I didn't see what superhuman strength and powers or people with super speed. What I saw were people who were really trying to adapt to this new lifestyle, living with amputation and the pain that came with it.

Chris Albert 00:07:22 (link to this point)

So can you talk to us a little bit about that pain that amputees go through? What causes it? How does it come about and how debilitating is it?

Amira Idris 00:07:31 (link to this point)

So the pain that I kept hearing about when I was working at the prosthetic clinic was the issue of phantom limb pain. And I had never heard about phantom limb pain before, when I went into this field. And so everyone kept talking about having pain in the limb that wasn't there, and not being able to do much about it, some people just waiting it out. And I found that this pain can really severely impact the quality of life of the individual, and most of the time affecting sleep. So you have people waking up at 02:00, 03:00 in the morning or in the middle of the night, and they can't go back to bed because they're having this pain that they can't alleviate.

And then finding out that medication was the number one method to manage this pain, which includes taking oxycodone, gabapentin, Neurox and Lyrica, and they weren't taking them in small dosages. So I have people taking them in large quantities and unfortunately, this medications have severe side effects. People talking about nausea, problems, And for me, I just thought it had to be something better, you know, and people talking about how, you know, in the middle of the night, they'll wake up just screaming in pain because, you know, they're having pain in a limb that they can't do anything about.

Chris Albert 00:08:43 (link to this point)

Yeah, so the drug problem has been huge in the veteran community. By and large, become addicted because of our doctors, because of our doctors prescribing things to us. So when we're talking about things like oxycodone and OxyContin, these are drugs that literally embed themselves into your DNA. Don't just go into the body and come out. They embed themselves into your DNA and once once you get taken over by that addiction, you're gonna have it for a long time.

It is really, really, really difficult to come out of for a lot of people. And so anything that will keep veterans away from these painkillers that have been prescribed like Tic Tacs by the VA over the last decade is gonna have a positive impact here. So, you know, I think that's definitely something that we need to make sure that the veteran community continues to before. I think everybody in general prescription drugs in this country are, you know, so many people are addicted right now.

Amira Idris 00:09:52 (link to this point)

Yeah, I couldn't agree more. And it's funny because when I first found out about this problem, I didn't even know about the opioid epidemic that was happening in The United States. It was actually later on. I mean, I saw this in when I was working in clinic and the people I met and people I interviewed, but I didn't know it was a problem until I started hearing in the news. It's like, my goodness, this is actually real.

This is really happening. People lives are being like ruined by taking, abusing the medications that you're taking. And again, they have really easy access to it.

Chris Albert 00:10:22 (link to this point)

Yeah, absolutely. And that's the thing. For everybody out there, I'm not anti drug. I believe that anybody should be able to use whatever they need in order to feel better. I'm definitely pro cannabis.

I'm definitely pro legalization of most drugs. My problem with these opiates is that they were prescribed without really explaining the addiction problems without really explaining how this could affect somebody for the rest of their lives and the impact on the body. I think that, you know, we got ourselves headfirst into a crisis here with those. So when it comes to the TheraV Elix, can you explain the device? First off, what is it?

What how does it work?

Amira Idris 00:11:11 (link to this point)

That's a good question. So basically the TheraV Elix is a strap that you wear over the residual limb and it basically applies vibration therapy, which stimulates the nerve endings of the limb disrupting the pain signals that has been relayed to the brain. So you might not know this, but the reason why a lot of people have phantom limb pain or phantom sensation is after you get an amputation, the nerves that were once connected to that limb is still there. They've just basically been snipped shorter. So the brain is still sending signals to those nerve endings, and it's not getting the feedback that it's been programmed to receive.

So what your body does is it starts to panic, it's like something is wrong, and it's sending all this mixed signals to your brain, and what your brain interprets it as pain, know, something's wrong, so it sends it to the pain portion of the brain. And so now you're feeling like your leg is on fire, pins and needles, you're having pain in the limb that you know it's not there. So in basically, to summarize your brain is too smart for itself. And so what we found out is that by mechanically stimulating the nerve endings, we can help with that pain alleviation or relief because we're given some type of feedback back to the brain. And I mean, by no means are we going to completely eliminate medication or drugs, but we want to reduce the number of medications people have to take.

We have people who are opting out from taking the medication completely that would rather be in pain. I have a former US Marine who said, you know, I would rather be, it's better to be in pain than to have the meds mess with my mind, because he kept, he told me about how sometimes he would forget to slip up his fly. So he said, yeah, was, I'm 28, but I feel like 88, because I sometimes forget to slip up my fly often and I can't remember the four digit number for my ATM. It's like I just decided to stop taking my medication. I'd rather be in pain than really feel terrible after I take my medication.

So the idea of our device is to give people who don't want to take their medication an alternative and for people who want to reduce the number of medications they're taking an alternative to help them with that.

Chris Albert 00:13:14 (link to this point)

Wow. Yeah.

The, like I said, the absolute impact on the mind from from just constantly taking those meds is horrible. And the theory sounds sounds fantastic. Now when it comes to actually producing the product, where are you out? Where are you at with production? And how many of these are there out there right now?

Amira Idris 00:13:36 (link to this point)

So right now we're currently produced in the devices that we're planning to launch the first quarter of this year, the end of the first quarter of this year. And we're planning to only release about 100 to 130 of the devices this year alone. And more than half of those devices, the goal is to get them to veterans who have amputations. And we've been raising the funds to help us make those devices that we want to donate. And so far we've been able to fund 50 devices that we're planning to give out to veterans with amputations.

Chris Albert 00:14:09 (link to this point)

Awesome. Yeah. And so what we're basically trying to do here is we're trying to get more of these devices out to veterans and we're trying to get more of these devices out to, people who can use them and give some feedback on how they're working, correct?

Amira Idris 00:14:22 (link to this point)

Yes, exactly, exactly. So one of the things that we want to start doing is when giving out the devices is again, to thank our veterans for the sacrifice they've made. They've literally put their limb on the line for us and also to get their feedback on is the device helping because that would also help us further improve the device as we start to release it into the market, maybe sometime next year.

Chris Albert 00:14:46 (link to this point)

Very cool. And so you've been trying, you tried to go through the VA to do this and what happened there?

Amira Idris 00:14:54 (link to this point)

It's been just a challenge trying to find the right people to speak with and trying to get through the front door for, I've even spoken to veterans who have told me that they've had challenges trying to go to the VA to help other veterans like other So veteran I'm just like, I'm not a veteran, I'm not in the military, I'm not in the army, so they're having a hard time. So makes sense that I'm having a difficult time trying to figure out how can I have the VA help me get these devices to veterans who have amputation? Or how can I have veteran organizations help me get this devices to veterans who are in need of this devices and help me conduct a study to really validate that this device does what it says it does to really show that, you know, our device has benefits to people who need it?

Chris Albert 00:15:39 (link to this point)

Yeah, and that's the thing. There's so many great people who work at the VA, Right? So there's so many health care workers who choose to work there because they really, really want to help veterans. The problem is that when we get wrapped up in government bureaucracy and all these steps that that provide obstacles to people like yourself who genuinely want to help and try something new, that's when we start to get these real holdups and a lot of veterans not getting the care that they deserve.

Amira Idris 00:16:08 (link to this point)

And I think even being a startup and being a new company with a new device, it makes it even very challenging, So like Under Armour or Nike or like big brand names, I'm a startup and I have a device that I know helps people who have the need for it, but it's trying to get past, oh, you're a startup, you know, you're a new company, we don't want to have anything to do with that.

Chris Albert 00:16:29 (link to this point)

Absolutely. You know, patience, patience in getting these things out there. And I think you're doing the right thing, which is to get these hands into the right... The the... Get these devices into the hands of the right people and to really get some feedback on how they're working so that you can perfect the device and that you can make sure that it helps even more.

Amira Idris 00:16:54 (link to this point)

Exactly.

Chris Albert 00:16:55 (link to this point)

So one other question I had here was, let's say somebody has their whole limb and they're experiencing pain in that limb. Could the device potentially help in that situation as well too?

Amira Idris 00:17:08 (link to this point)

Yes, it can. And this is based on published work out there on the benefits of vibration therapy. So our device applies customized vibration therapy for nerve pain. So you don't have to have an amputation if you have some kind of nerve pain, some kind of nerve damage and you're experiencing symptoms like phantom limb sensation. I've had people who their arm is paralyzed, but they still feel like there are moves, they still have that phantom limb sensation.

If you have muscle spasticity, vibration has been shown to help with that, it's been shown to help with increased blood circulation, it's been shown to help with gait. I mean, there are other benefits of using vibration therapy, not just for people who have phantom limb pain. And so our device should be able to help people who have other type of nerve pain that are not amputees. So if you have your whole limb, even if have sore muscles, it's a form of massage, right? So vibration has been shown to help with that.

Chris Albert 00:18:06 (link to this point)

Awesome. So there's a lot of implications here for many things down the line, whether, you know, helping out amputees to helping out athletes who are experiencing muscle soreness and pain in different places and a lot of different situations here. For right now, how can veterans get in touch with you to become part of your study?

Amira Idris 00:18:30 (link to this point)

So they can visit my website, which is weartherav.com. That's weartherav.com. And right on the bottom of the page, there's a place to sign up to request the device. You can also email me at info@weartherav.com. So that's INFOWEARTHERAV dot com.

Or you can reach me on my number at (302) 455-7709. And either of these three methods, they can contact me and let me know that they are interested in receiving the device. And in return, I'll reach back out to them just to get their story and understand their experience with phantom limb pain and phantom limb sensation.

Chris Albert 00:19:19 (link to this point)

Awesome. And, you know, I want to thank you for coming on today. I think I think what you're doing is absolutely amazing. Is... Are there any...

Are you gonna be at any places in the future as far as, you know, are you gonna set up any any booths at trade shows or anything like that where where people will be able to meet you and and maybe try the device out?

Amira Idris 00:19:43 (link to this point)

Yeah, so last year, I went to the National Amputee Coalition Conference in Louisville, Kentucky. And that was the first time we brought our prototype out to the general public and had people try the device. Got tremendous feedback. So we're planning to do that again this year. I think it's in Tucson, Arizona, I believe this year is where the event is going to be held.

And we've also been trying to look into attending different events where veterans would be participating in, looking towards like some of the Wounded Warrior events that we might be able to attend. So right now we're in the process of contacting different veteran organizations to see what events can we come and attend and bring our device and have veterans who might be in need of our device to try it on for themselves. And if someone is interested in trying the device, they can reach out to me, I can send them a prototype to try on. And if it does help them, I'll send them that device once we have manufactured it also.

Chris Albert 00:20:37 (link to this point)

Awesome. Awesome.

All right. Well, Amira, I want to thank you again for coming on and I will get all of your contact information up on the show notes so people can get in touch with you. And if you're a veteran or if you know of a veteran who is suffering from an amputation, suffering from phantom limb pain, you know, get them in touch with this device. It's definitely something that could potentially help them out in the future and help out a lot of veterans just from and don't think it don't think of it as like you're taking something for free. Think of it as you're taking something and giving something back in the form of in the form of information.

Almost said amputation in the form of information that can seriously help so many people around the country and so many veterans around the country to overcome this horrible pain and keep them away from prescription drugs that are going to harm them even further.