Tuesday, May 13, 2008

Knee Surgery!

My husband went back to the doctor and the results from the MRI on his knee show a lateral tear in his meniscus.


Courtesy of About.com:

There are generally two surgical options for treating a meniscus tear:

A meniscus repair is a surgical procedure done to repair the damaged meniscus. This procedure can restore the normal anatomy of the knee, and has a better long-term prognosis when successful. However, the meniscus repair is a more significant surgery, the recovery is longer, and, because of limited blood supply to the meniscus, it is not always possible.
A meniscectomy is a procedure to remove the torn portion of the meniscus. This procedure is far more commonly performed than a meniscus repair. Most meniscus tears cannot be treated by a repair for a number of reasons. Often the tear is in an avascular region of the meniscus, and will not heal even if repaired. Some tears are frayed and cannot be sutured together. In these cases, the meniscectomy is done to remove the damaged portion of meniscus. The meniscectomy has a faster recovery, but it can lead to trouble years down the road because of the absence of the normal meniscus.

It would be better if he can have it repaired, but that is not always possible. The doctor said there is only a 20% chance that it could be repaired. The recovery time for a repair is much longer than if they cut the torn portion off. The doctor told AC that if he has surgery on Thursday, he can be back at a desk job on Monday (removal surgery not repair). The only problem is that he doesn't have a desk job. He will be talking to his boss today about when he should schedule the surgery. I would like him to have it done as soon as possible, since it will not get better with the surgery. He has it scheduled for May 30th, but hopefully he can move it up.

Always something. I have Sketch Club tonight! Have a good one.

2 comments:

toners said...

Hey Darcey, my friend Sue recently had the same problem. She had surgery about 2 weeks ago. Her blog is www.livinglifeincolorfulcolorado.blogspot.com :)

Linda said...

I'm sorry to hear about your dh. I hope everything goes ok for him.