Meniscus tear

[smevchenko]

Only saw your reference to this in the Rodri thread.

I annihilated my knee playing football at the end of January, unfortunately for me it was misdiagnosed a few times initially because I had zero swelling which even my surgeon said was utterly bizarre when he did first operation.

I couldn’t place weight on my foot and couldn’t straighten my leg, but was told it was just soft tissue damage.

After a few weeks eventually forced through an initial X-ray to get to the MRI stage and phoned every day until I got a cancellation to bring forward the MRI.

Waited 7/10 days for the MRI results and was dumbstruck when I saw them, I remember vividly opening the email and double checking it was correct results as it was like an essay of damage - did about 5/6 different bits of damage, but the main 2 were a bucket handle tear of medial meniscus and full rupture of ACL.

Saw the surgeon and as it had been 8 weeks since the injury was rushed in for the meniscus repair as the longer they leave it the worse the prognosis as there is poor blood supply to the inside of the meniscus - this is I suppose where it will relate to your injury - if they do a meniscectomy then it doesn’t take as long to recover but will likely result in advanced arthritis in future. If they do a meniscus repair, which is what I had, where they stitch it back in place rather than remove the affected part, then long term it’s better but the rehab is longer. I wasn’t allowed to weight bear for 6 weeks which was hell.

My surgeon does Prem footballers, Super League players and top athletes, and he advised we did my knee as 2 stage, as if he’d done the ACL whilst repairing my meniscus he said there was a high risk of me having a limp for the rest of my life. Consequently I had the repair in April and then done 4 months of strengthening ahead of me having my ACL reconstruction next week where they replace my ACL with part of my hamstring. At least I’ve had the summer, and now don’t really miss playing golf over the winter months.

Hope yours goes to plan, any questions just let me know, I’ve spent months speaking to consultants about all the different aspects.

Sounds just like mine, also misdiagnosed at first, think I had torn my ACL a few months before but it had grafted back on to something else which stabilised it a bit more and gave me less concern for a while as I was playing football still so didn’t even consider it was an ACL issue.

Then it went again rather horrifically and repaired in two stages like yours.

 

[Rammy Blue]

Sounds just like mine, also misdiagnosed at first, think I had torn my ACL a few months before but it had grafted back on to something else which stabilised it a bit more and gave me less concern for a while as I was playing football still so didn’t even consider it was an ACL issue.

Then it went again rather horrifically and repaired in two stages like yours.

They reckoned that I’d probably partially torn my ACL years earlier but not fully ruptured it, then this injury finished it off. The bugger with mine was this bucket handle tear, where the “flap” had then folded over inside my knee which is what was stopping me straightening my leg. Because I’d had 8 weeks without straightening it then if the surgeon had done my ACL at the same time as repairing my meniscus then because I had to have 6 weeks of no weight bearing it’d have been further issues for the rehab.

To be honest, it’s not been too bad in the end. I miss running as I used to do that twice a week, but soon got out of that habit. Played football twice a week, which I also miss but again soon got out of the habit. At least playing golf and going to the gym has kept me sane. I’m ready for the ACL now, and having had a prolonged rehab from when they did the meniscus repair then at least I know what I’m facing from next week.

Ready for it now, just want to crack on!