A young girl who is missing digits from her right hand has told how she can now grip a tennis racket - thanks to a new bionic hand built by a 3D printer.

Baylee Abbott, 11, was born with congenital limb deformities, leaving her with with she describes as 'half a hand'.

But in a heartwarming video Baylee told the Liverpool Echo how her new 3D hand has changed her life.

Baylee, from the Wirral, who is also missing her left foot past the ankle and some toes from her right foot, describes herself as 'just a normal girl' in the video and shows off how the brightly coloured bionic device fits on to her hand.

The primary school pupil, who has worn prosthetic limbs since she was just two, was put in touch with charity Reach after she gave a talk at her school describing what it felt like to be stared at.

The charity helped her find a website called Enabling the Future, which offers children designs for prosthetic limbs which can be created using a 3D printer.

Her dad, Jason, got a local community of makers and entrepreneurs called DoES Liverpool and with their help Baylee was able to use their 3D printer to create her very own plastic bionic hand.

Baylee said: “I first heard about 3D printing at Reach. I met a man who had a bionic hand which could pick things up and shake hands. He could also spin it around 360 degrees.

“It looked really cool but the man told us how it had changed his life and how he had gone from being someone with no hope to a new person and a real excitement about life.”

Baylee says she can now hold a tennis racket with her new hand and says it has given her an “extra boost of confidence”.

Adrian McEwen, from DoES, said: “It can take several hours and the designs allow you to print different components which then need to be fixed together. The hand Baylee wears is actually the second design as the first didn’t allow her to grip properly but the new one has four fingers and thumb.”

He added: “This is a rapidly developing area of prosthetics as 3D technology enables people to take designs from around the world and create new limbs to meet their needs. As materials develop and evolve we’ll see people being able to create new prosthetics in their own homes that are more flexible and look real.”

http: //www.mirror.co.uk/news/technology-science/technology/baylee-abbott-young-girl-missing-5799933

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