Update;Arthroscopic Surgery

[jwr 0]

I posted back in late October asking some questions about surgery. I figured I would give an update.

MRI results came back confirming flap tear in the medial meniscus. I had the surgery on Dec 10th. I had two goals in mind. One is that I wanted to walk out of the hospital after surgery. Two, I wanted to skate within 4 weeks.

The surgery went well. I was wheeled into surgery at 8:30am and was walking out of the hospital at 11:30am. One goal completed. No real pain.

The next couple of days I just hung around and went back to my desk job the following week. Went back for my follow up to get stitches out after 7 days. The ortho said surgery went well the knee looked good-he showed me some pictures. But he did have to remove close to 45% of my medial meniscus-big tear. He said to start PT the following week and just keep my leg elevated.

Was evaluated for PT the following week and therapist advised that I start icing knee 6-7x a day because there was some swelling. Made a commitement to myself to really push myself during rehab. So went to PT 3x a week and did my at home exercises and iced my knee every chance I got. I really worked hard at PT if they wanted me to do 10 reps I did 20. Plus, I learned so much about my body and stretching and muscle imbalances.

Two weeks later I hit the ice for what was to be just to skate in warm ups with my usual pick up game with guys my age late 30's/early 40's. Second goal completed. It felt a bit wobbly but not too bad and I wound up playing the whole pick up session taking a regular shift. Continued with PT and stepped up workouts.

It is now close to 3 months post surgery. The knee itself is 90%. I still think about the knee ocassionally. I will have to workout my quads and especially my VMO muscles for the rest of my life. It will probably never be 100%. I still get some pain after skating back to back nights.

My advice to anyone thinking about this surgery is to talk to a PT before the surgery. Sometimes there are exercises you can do that will help post surgery. Ice your knee as much as you can stand in 20min intervals as soon as you get home from surgery. Swelling is your enemy it shuts down muscle function. Don't wait like I did to have the surgery. I hobbled around for close to two months with my knee locking up and it set me up for other muscle issues that I wouldn't have had. The other piece of advice is that if you have torn cartilage that isn't causing you too much pain or locking up your knee opt out of surgery for as long as you can. It is tough asking muscles to do the job of cartilage as well. Take PT seriously. If I go two days without doing my stretches and exercises I can tell the difference in my knee. It's tough coming back at 40-but I am back.

[Caustic Mick 0]

Great advice, amazing it only took two weeks to get back on the ice. My first solely meniscus repair (not the ACL surgeries), took nearly a month to get back to active. Any surgery is tough to recover from, and you'll always think about those knees, but working on flexibility and strength will help you avoid atrophy and loss of strength in the knee. Good luck!

[BGM 0]

I posted back in late October asking some questions about surgery. I figured I would give an update.

MRI results came back confirming flap tear in the medial meniscus. I had the surgery on Dec 10th. I had two goals in mind. One is that I wanted to walk out of the hospital after surgery. Two, I wanted to skate within 4 weeks.

The surgery went well. I was wheeled into surgery at 8:30am and was walking out of the hospital at 11:30am. One goal completed. No real pain.

The next couple of days I just hung around and went back to my desk job the following week. Went back for my follow up to get stitches out after 7 days. The ortho said surgery went well the knee looked good-he showed me some pictures. But he did have to remove close to 45% of my medial meniscus-big tear. He said to start PT the following week and just keep my leg elevated.

Was evaluated for PT the following week and therapist advised that I start icing knee 6-7x a day because there was some swelling. Made a commitement to myself to really push myself during rehab. So went to PT 3x a week and did my at home exercises and iced my knee every chance I got. I really worked hard at PT if they wanted me to do 10 reps I did 20. Plus, I learned so much about my body and stretching and muscle imbalances.

Two weeks later I hit the ice for what was to be just to skate in warm ups with my usual pick up game with guys my age late 30's/early 40's. Second goal completed. It felt a bit wobbly but not too bad and I wound up playing the whole pick up session taking a regular shift. Continued with PT and stepped up workouts.

It is now close to 3 months post surgery. The knee itself is 90%. I still think about the knee ocassionally. I will have to workout my quads and especially my VMO muscles for the rest of my life. It will probably never be 100%. I still get some pain after skating back to back nights.

My advice to anyone thinking about this surgery is to talk to a PT before the surgery. Sometimes there are exercises you can do that will help post surgery. Ice your knee as much as you can stand in 20min intervals as soon as you get home from surgery. Swelling is your enemy it shuts down muscle function. Don't wait like I did to have the surgery. I hobbled around for close to two months with my knee locking up and it set me up for other muscle issues that I wouldn't have had. The other piece of advice is that if you have torn cartilage that isn't causing you too much pain or locking up your knee opt out of surgery for as long as you can. It is tough asking muscles to do the job of cartilage as well. Take PT seriously. If I go two days without doing my stretches and exercises I can tell the difference in my knee. It's tough coming back at 40-but I am back.

We had exactly the same surgery almost to the exact day. I had mine on Dec 7th---was in at 9:30 and out by 12:30. Like you I had a small meniscus tear. Except this was my 2nd scope--I had one Dec 06 which they just removed Plica--apparently a year ago the MRI did not show the meniscus problem so this second one did. Both scopes I was on the bike the next day and was skating within 3-4 weeks (but not in game shape yet). I'm probably at about 80-90% and PT says I can start running on it next week and I hope to be back playing b-ball on it in 3 weeks. It's still irritated---PR says the last 20% strength is the hardest to get back. Good luck.