Estimated read time: 2-3 minutes
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Ed Yeates ReportingA 13-year-old teenager from Pocatello is becoming pretty good at the art of archery, but the way he handles a bow and shoots an arrow is not what you'd expect to see.
Hitting the Bulls Eye, he proves he's pretty good at shooting a bow. In this case, though, 13-year old Chris Cutler doesn't have a left arm. So, how does he do it?
At Shriner's Hospital, Scott Hosie and his colleagues made Chris an arm from nuts, bolts bars and connections and a pediatric knee joint. Gideon Jolly, who heads up engineering at the Hoyt company, then adapted one of their bows to complete the prosthesis.
Scott Hosie, Prosthetist, Shriner's Hospital: "When someone doesn't have an arm, we no longer have to design around the human body. Now, we can just decide how to figure out what is going to work best and eliminate everything in between."
This unique partnership between Shriner's and Hoyt pulled off a creation that's now given the Idaho teen a whole new spin on archery. Chris' passion for archery goes way back; In fact, before he got this modification, he was drawing the bow with his teeth.
Chris Cutler: "I had a katha tab and it would go into my mouth, and I would clamp down on that and pull back with my teeth."
Chris lost his arm to cancer when he was only two and half months old. By the time he was old enough to really taste the outdoors, this is what he's wanted to do. The unique arm has adjustments for all angles and rotations so Chris can site and shoot. And shoot he does. First one bull's eye, then another, almost a split arrow.
Chris Cutler: "Wow, how could I make it that close with just barely starting with this bow?"
