1. Field of the Invention
In bone surgery it is often required that a wedge of bone be taken to make a correction of deformity. This has been traditionally done by making "pie shaped" wedges and more recently by the "curved-v", more properly called the arcuate wedge, osteotomy that makes precise wedges and therefore precise corrections.
2. Prior Art
The making of arcuate wedge cuts in bone has been described in U.S Pat. Nos. 4,150,675, 4,349,058, 4,501,268, and 4,502,474, by this inventor. It is further described in patent application Ser. Nos. 534,505 and 721,640. Various guides are used to make a precise wedge from an arcuate osteotomy of bone. In addition guides have been made adjustable to allow the surgeon to take a desired arcuate wedge segment in one osteotomy while being able to change the angular dimension of the guide while in surgery for the next osteotomy to be performed. These guides have been fabricated in prototype with deep slots that converge toward each other (U.S. Pat. No. 4,501,268) so that the surgeon can take a precise "pie shaped" wedge if he requires to; this is seldom since there is an iatrogenic shortening of bone with this type of wedge.