ACL, medial meniscus tear, lateral meniscus tear. Anybody else been through this?

[Rossta]

Got the MRI results in, and they're not looking too good. I've had ACL surgery twice before. Once in each knee.

In my layman's paraphrasing of what it is, part of my meniscus has several small tears, while the other part has a full tear (I think on the lateral side, very close to my PCL). There is also a piece of cartilage floating around in there, which broke off the femur.

According to the MRI report, which is in a language I don't speak...
-There is a large joint effusion
-There is a peripheral vertical tear with longitudinal extension involving the horn segment medial meniscus. This extends into the body segment. There are impaction contusions with bone marrow edema in the posterior medial femur and and postero medial tibial plateau. There is small areas of cartilage fissureing medial femoral condyle seen on sagittal seven and corresponding coronal four.
-There is a radial tear of the posterior horn root attachment lateral meniscus with a small intermediate signal flap which may be meniscal or chondral origin as seen on sagittal 15. There is cartilage erosion to bone in the posterior lateral femoral condyle and postero lateral tibial plateau. There is chondral debri in the lateral gutter just below the lateral tibial plateau as seen on sagittal six. There is a well defined full-thickness portion articular cartilage measuring 10mm in length at the anterior aspect of the intercondylar notch seen on sagitall 12 and coronal 12. This defect has been displaced from the lateral femur.

So, (once again in my layman's paraphrasing), the doctor wants to reconstruct the acl with an patellar allograft, cut away the meniscus that is partially torn, sew together the meniscus that is fully torn, and do some sort of bone breaking thing on my femur to stimulate the growth of new cartilage.

recovery= 6 weeks on crutches. 9 months for the acl.

Thoughts? Will I ever ski again? The doctor said arthritis is a given.

[Rossta]

here's a good article on meniscal tears for anyone with a similar injury who happens to be looking for more info.
http://www.sportsinjurybulletin.com/...cal-tears.html

[ate'em]

yup, in pretty much the same boat, more or less.
had surgery two weeks ago, doc stiched back togeter a complete radial tear of my lateral meniscus, no trimming of meniscus (hooray).
ACL repaired with patellar tendon, MCL with hamstring autograft.

simlilar prognosis re: crutches and rehab time.
i cant speak to the femur/cartilage issue, sounds a bit nasty. second opinion? i have a tibial plateua fracture which is child's play in the big scheme of my injury, and should heal no problem on its own.

ortho did think that because of the bone drilling and fluid swelling from the acl/mcl reconstruction, that the meniscus has a very good chance of 100% recovery. all these cells released into the knee capsule apparently act like a stem cell injection to help the meniscus tissues to heal.

arthritis a possibility, but definately not a guarentee. like i said, he though i would have 100% recovery so long as i am patient and slow with the PT. doc was laprade from steadman clinic, so a respected opinion there.
definitely will be able to ski again. doc had complete confidence on that.

second opinion always a good idea. i saw another well regarded ortho first, and was really glad for the second opinion, who i ultimately went with for the reconstruction. the cost of a consultation is nothing in the big scheme. cracking the femur? i'd get another opinion on that one.

best of luck, it'll get better from here

[valli]

I had something pretty similar, also with LaPrade two weeks ago. Since I'm in my forties he did allografts for the ACL and the LCL, and stitched up a pretty big tear in the medial meniscus and did a very minimal trim of the lateral meniscus. He said I should be back skiing by Christmas, although he recommended a brace for the first season.

[Rossta]

Thanks for the replies. Going under the knife in just over 5 hours.

Kinda anxious. It's like the feeling you get standing on top of a steep ass line and you can't really see what you're about to drop in to.

I've bulked up about 10 pounds, and spent a lot of time riding my bike. I'm about as ready as ill ever be.

Here we go.

Cheers.