WAUWATOSA - Hailey Danisewicz lost her left leg to cancer four years ago. Now, she is president of the junior class at Wauwatosa East High School, a competitive tennis player and an aspiring track athlete. She credits the prosthetic legs customized for her by Orthotic and Prosthetic Services with helping her to overcome obstacles. “There’s a lot of amazing technology in this thing,” she said holding one of the two interchangeable prosthetic legs she wears. One is for running. The other is for less challenging exploits. When Hailey’s leg was removed, she had already consulted with Jay Wood of Orthotic and Prosthetic Services. She knew she wanted him to put together a leg for her. His creations are described by his peers as “state of the art” and he had a bedside manner that Hailey and her mother appreciated. “Hailey would call him with a problem,” Gigi Danisewicz said. “And, we’d get in that day.” But the Danisewicz’s health insurance provider wouldn’t cover the high-tech creations of Wood. “The insurance company kind of had us in a straight jacket,” Hailey said with a knowing shrug of her shoulders that belied her tender age. “They said we had to go to this one place.” That one place didn’t have the sort of gear needed for a budding athlete. The gear they made was far more pedestrian, tailored to elderly sedentary people. Fortunately, Hailey’s family had the resources needed to pay for what she needed out of pocket, but Hailey worries about what will be covered in the future when her $30,000 limbs wear out. “Once I’m off on my own, I don’t know if I’m going to be able to cover the cost of that,” she said. “Because they can be pretty expensive.” Jake Wood is finding his business strained by the unwillingness of insurance companies to pay for the latest technology. “With prosthetics or orthotics, there may be no coverage at all,” he said. Wood is engaged in a grass-roots effort to pass a so-called parity bill in Madison. The bill would require any insurance company collecting premiums in Wisconsin to cover the sort of prosthetics Hailey uses. That would be a relief to Hailey’s mother. “I can’t even say in words how proud we are of her, how she just carries on like it's nothing,” Gigi Danisewicz said.