About one in 1000 Kiwis have lost a limb - and that could increase with the demands of an ageing population and chronic disease.
Now a new state-of-the-art centre which manufactures artificial limbs has just opened in Christchurch.
Nine-year-old Aubrey Winter has got a mean kick on him - and that's due to his prosthetic leg. He's had a 'new' leg since he was one.
"Aubrey was born with a condition which means he was missing the fibula in his lower leg," mother Krystle Winter said.
He's one of the thousands who need artificial limb services like Peke Waihanga, Christchurch's artificial limb service centre, which was opened on Friday after a $6 million Government investment.
"People would typically spend a day here for the services that they need, but the technological services in this new facility, that time is brought down to 90 minutes per person or family and that's a huge time-saving," said Minister for Disability Issues Priyanca Radhakrishnan.
Workshop lead Craig Harrington has also been involved with the centre most of his life. He not only knows how to make prosthetics but he also wears one.
"I was an amputee when I was 15 from a motorbike accident with a bus," he said.
And he knows the stigma it used to carry.
"It was all about making it look real, don't mention it and dust it under the carpet," Harrington said.
But 3D scanning has changed that.
"People want to show it off, they want the fancy componentry, they want the sockets with the faces and patterns and anything."
This facility will support nearly 700 amputees and, with 3D scanning, your leg can look like a cat - or even Elvis.
"To look back to when he was a baby we didn't really know whether Aubrey would be able to run," Krystle said.
Now there's no stopping him.
