Post ACL Recon / Mensicus Repair Questions

[blinkme323]

Hey everyone, first post to the forum but I have been browsing around here for some time now. I'm about 2.5 weeks out from an ACL recon and medial meniscus repair and things seem to be going fairly well. I did have two quick questions though:

1). After the surgery the doctor told my wife that he "hopes that the meniscus repair holds up". However, he didn't mention anything in my follow up last week. Does anyone know what the success rate is / should I be concerned?

2). I still cannot fully straighten my knee which kind of has me worried. I've heard some horror stories from people who have never been able to straighten their leg and I can imagine the impact that would have on me getting back on the slopes. Any advice there?

Thanks in advance!

[spook]

i tore my acl and a pinky finger sized chunk of my medial meniscus. they decided the piece of meniscus was in good enough shape to stitch it back to the rest of the meniscus rather than take it out and accelerate the degradation process. 6 years later i was running on the beach on a slight slant and i heard a pop and that was that. the big piece popped its stitch and after that many more years of use there wasn't anything they could do but take it out. that was 13 years ago. i was doing fine playing soccer year round, backpacking, snowboarding, etc., until about 3 years ago and now i have pretty serious arthritis and bone spurs where the meniscus was.

all i can say is unless you are a pro (and if you were you wouldn't be asking these questions here) take your time and be thorough and exact about rehab.

[blinkme323]

Thanks for the advice Spook. The doctor seemed to imply that he would have to remove my whole medial meniscus should this repair fail, so that's why I was so concerned.

You're right though, nothing I can do now except follow PT and rehab by the letter.

[joetron]

Getting back to full extension/hyper extension is a battle. You just gotta be very diligent with PT and regaining that ROM should be the priority for your therapist.
Did you do hamstring or patella graft? I'm 4 months out from a hammy graft and still stretching and checking my extension every day.

[neufox47]

Talk to your PT about when you can start strength training. Get all your movement issues worked out, especially the ankles and hips. Start a complete body functional training program with an emphasis on injury prevention. Checkout Advances in Functional Training by Boyle if you want to have a academic understanding of the exercises.

Don't jog, ever. Sprint or walk. Single leg work is your friend. Perfect your squatting motion.

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