Posted on March 19, 2018
With new prosthesis and encouragement from her Mary Free Bed team, Dottie Kuklewski ‘just keeps going’
Dottie Kuklewski developed an infection that forced doctors to amputate her leg. She went to Mary Free Bed for rehabilitation and spent several weeks in the inpatient Amputee Program. Since then, Dottie used a wheelchair exclusively for mobility, hesitant to try a prosthesis.
About two years later, Dottie needed a new shrinker for her residual limb. Mary Free Bed’s amputee care liaison, Stephanie Rose, visited Dottie at her home. That’s when things began to change.
“She had been sleeping in a hospital bed in her living room, and she said she just wanted to be able to sleep in her own bed again,” Stephanie said. “I asked why she hadn’t pursued a prosthesis, and she told me her story. I encouraged her to come to the Amputee Clinic and talk with Dr. (Benjamin) Bruinsma to see what we could do to help her walk again. She agreed.”
In this video, Dottie, now 84, shares her story and how she’s “opened her world back up.”
