Spokane toddler gets state-of-the-art bionic arms, hands

PORTLAND (KPTV) -- Eighteen-month-old Jameson Davis was born with only partial arms, but now he may be the youngest person ever to get a set of state-of-the-art bionic arms and hands.

Jameson and his parents, Brooke and Jim, live in Spokane, but recently visited Advanced Arm Dynamics in Portland, where engineers and technicians designed and built Jameson's new arms.

It's not easy to design artificial limbs for a toddler because he can't tell you what he needs and wants.

But Kerstin Baum, a rehab coordinator, worked with Jameson, learning about what he likes to do and which toys he prefers.

She also had to figure out what he'll want to do in the near future; for instance, riding a tricycle.

Braun gave that information to Mac Lang and his design team at Advanced Arm Dynamics.   Their challenge was to make arms that Jameson would find comfortable and that he could eventually operate himself.

"We wanted to make it as functional as possible to give him the best ability to use it and to want to use it," Lang said.

FOX 12 watched Jameson as he tried out his right and left arms for the first time, and started to figure out how to use them. Grabbing and gripping, Jameson tried to pick up everything, even tiny M&Ms.

For now, these artificial limbs may be more like toys to Jameson, but his parents hope he'll someday see how these new tools can help him live life to the fullest.

"Imagine where prosthetics will be when he's in high school. I mean, imagine the possibilities. So why not give him the tools available so that as he grows up, that's what he knows," said Jim Davis, Jameson's father.

MORE:Read the Davis family's blog