TurboMed History

In 2001, François Côté suffered several injuries during a snowmobile accident. After several months of rehabilitation, he continued to suffer from permanent sequelae in the levator muscle of the left foot, also known as “foot drop”.

“Foot drop” (or weakness of the foot levator) refers to a pathology that prevents people with this condition from properly lifting one of their feet and toes of the affected leg as they walk. Impairing, lower limb mobility and confidence of the affected person. This results in the foot pointing downwards resulting in the toes dragging against the ground making walking on uneven or flat surfaces a real obstacle which can often lead to trips and falls.

To compensate for this imbalance, patients often fall into the habit of compensating by raising their hips to the affected side or by raising their feet higher thanks to the mobility of their pelvis or torso. Some even tend to walk on the outside of their feet. Walking then requires a lot of effort and concentration and consequently becomes, over time, uncomfortable and exhausting, generating pain in the pelvis and back.

Living with many of these disadvantages, and with the ardent desire to remain active and to find a better mobility again, François used his talents as a draftsman to develop and design an orthosis that would allow him to hope for a better quality of life and continue to practice his favourite sport, running.

It was in his garage that he designed several orthoses which he tested himself during several races (half marathons, marathons). Twenty-eight (28) prototypes in total were created and tested before arriving at the current version we see today.

The meeting of François and Stéphane Savard was to be decisive for the future of the product; together, they perfected the product and began marketing this revolutionary TurboMed AFO in March 2015. To date, TurboMed orthoses are distributed in more than 20 countries and sold in more than 35 countries around the world.

On October 26, 2017, the business moved in to a new 6,000-square-foot head office in Quebec, Canada to accommodate the growth and success of the Turbomed across the globe.