[at-l] Knee Surgery?

[Jan Leitschuh]

With HotDog and Jim and others facing knee surgery and rehab, this information came up on the women's list.
I pass it along in the spirit of helpfulness.
(Further hugs to HotDog's knee..)


  Re: Knee surgery

I'm not a medical expert on knee replacement but I design software for
computer-assisted knee surgery, so I'm very interested in your (and other
people) experience with knee surgery (I'm a computer engineer, not a
surgeon! But I have attended a couple of live knee surgeries).

When is your surgery planned? One thing I would recommend is to spend a lot
of time discussing options and expectations with your surgeon. There are
many types of implants and procedures available, and the choice depends a
lot on the patient (as well as the surgeon's experience and familiarity with
a given procedure or implant line). Let your doctor know if you're committed
to an aggressive physical therapy plan and to maintain an healthy weight
after surgery, and the type of activities you expect to do afterwards. In my
very personal opinion, a good surgeon should discuss with you the different
options and justify why he favors one over the others.

If you'd like to know exactly what happens during a knee surgery, you will
probably find this website very interesting:
http://www.edheads.org/activities/knee/index.htm. It's a flash-based
step-by-step virtual knee surgery, and it's technically accurate as far as I
can tell.

For the less faint of heart, there are live surgeries broadcast from
http://www.or-live.com/ , including several total-knee replacements. (But be
warned: orthopedic surgery can be quite graphic.)