World Prize 2014 honours a pioneer who has illustrated the importance of stress in osteoarthritis like no other before
Georg Bergmann, Deputy Director of the Julius Wolff Institute and head of the working group on instrumented implants, receives the 2014 World Prize for Osteoarthritis Research. With the World Prize, the German Athrosis Aid and the World Osteoarthritis Organization recognize his many years of research work, which has benefited millions of people and significantly changed orthopedics and physiotherapy.
The team of the Instrumented implants around Georg Bergmann were the first to succeed in measuring loads in a joint directly on humans. In 1988, after years of development work, the first instrumented hip endoprosthesis was implanted in a patient and the real effective loads on the hip were measured in real time. Here the scientists discovered that the hip joint is subjected to maximum loads of up to eight times the body weight, especially when stumbling. Since then, the measurement technology has been continuously developed further.
To date, the team has recorded stress data of the spine, knee, hip and shoulder joints of more than 50 patients. These data are accessible to everyone via the database www.Orthoload.com. At the beginning of 2014, the Julius Wolff Institute founded the OrthoLoad Club with renowned implant manufacturers. The club's goal is to intensify the exchange of information between scientific, clinical and industrial partners with regard to the problems of joint replacement and to jointly find solutions to improve orthopaedic implants.
Georg Bergmann was born in Berlin in 1947. He studied mechanical and biomedical engineering at the Technical University of Berlin. In 1974 he started his research work in the biomechanics laboratory of the Orthopaedic Clinic of the Free University of Berlin. After receiving his doctorate in 1981, he worked at the Harvard Medical School in Boston. In 1995 he habilitated and since 2003 he is professor at Charité - Universitätsmedizin Berlin. In 2008 Georg Bergmann founded the Julius Wolff Institute together with Georg Duda.
Contact
Julius Wolff Institute
Phone: +49 30 450 559 048
E-Mail: jwi(at)charite.de
Augustenburger Platz
113353 Berlin
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