Although Dr Graff treats complex conditions in children, she gives the same care and attention to children with more common conditions, such as sports injuries and children with normal ‘variations’ in limbs. She has busy orthopaedic clinics at the Women’s and Children’s Hospital. Dr Graff will also see most paediatric orthopaedic conditions through her private practice.
Dr Graff has treated many children with foot and ankle problems, such as club foot, flatfoot, Charcot-Marie-Tooth disease, tarsal coalition, and recurrent instability and foot pain after trauma.
The Rehabilitation Orthopaedic Clinic (REOR clinic) is a multidisciplinary clinic in which most children in South Australia with neuromuscular conditions requiring orthopaedic surgery are seen. Dr Graff is one of the leading surgeons for this clinic and specialises in treating children with cerebral palsy and other neuromuscular conditions.
The Women’s and Children’s Hospital (WCH) is the leading hospital in South Australia for paediatric trauma. Dr Graff is often on call for paediatric orthopaedic trauma at WCH and has vast experience in managing children’s injuries, from simple buckle fractures to life-changing growth plate fractures.
Some conditions, trauma or infections can leave children and adults with a difference in their limb length. Sometimes this can be managed without surgery, but often it is too difficult to live with high shoe raises and uneven walking.
Dr Graff is one of few orthopaedic surgeons in Adelaide who performs leg lengthening, with either a circular frame or an internal device.
One of Dr Graff’s favourite surgeries is deformity correction, as patients who have significant pain and disability have life changing results. Not only is the appearance of the limb changed, but patients are generally more functional, have less pain, and are at less risk of arthritis later in life.
Guided growth is the name given to minor surgery to allow the growth plate to grow in a certain way to correct deformities. This is usually performed at the knee or the ankle and can only be performed while the child is still growing. Often small plates and screws are used on one side of the growth plate to allow the other side of the growth plate to grow and correct the deformity over time.