Anterior Cruciate Ligament Tear Due to Skiing Accident
TRUE PERSONAL PATIENT STORY OF AN ACL (anterior cruciate ligament) TEAR AND RECONSTRUCTION
It was my last run down the mountain. But when you blow out an ACL, it is ALWAYS your last run. I was feeling great. It was my second trip out west to ski and I'd spend five straight days pounding the slopes in the Tetons. I had hit the peak of my skiing ability and unfortunately, my ego was pushing me near my physical limit. I was clearing a small cornice on that final day, and planning to ski straight to the shuttle bus for the airport and change my boots on the way to Jackson airport. Instead, I finished that run sliding down in a rescue sled. I wasn't in any pain. In fact, I wasn't sure that I had hurt myself. After a drop off of a couple feet, I landed just fine, but my left leg had taken most of the force of the landing and at the point that I hit, I felt a pop in my knee. Suddenly, it felt very unstable, and I was afraid to do anything beyond skiing straight ahead traversing across the slope. I was skiing with a physician who I had met on the ski lift that day and she was very firm in her opinion that I shouldn't ski down. I eventually agreed.
Once at the first aid clinic at the base of the mountain, the staff suspected a torn ACL, but they weren't sure and the swelling was so minor that I opted to hop on the shuttle and head for home. An old friend of mine was a ski patroller at that resort, and I left without the chance to tell him about what happened and was wondering when he would notice that my name on the rescuse list for that day.
Back at school, the student clinic wasn't much better at diagnosing the injury. Even the sports medicine specialist told me that my muscles were too tight to properly diagnose the injury. Because I lacked anything more than basic student health care, I continued to use and abuse my knee, and at several points over the next year, experienced its slipping out of place as I tried some sort of lateral move that it could no longer support. Biking and running and hiking were generally fine. Even ultimate Frisbee was OK as long as I played in deep sand. Any move that caused a quick lateral stop, or cut would send the knee out of joint and me into a lump on the ground waiting for the pain to stop.
Later that year, armed with full health care coverage and determined to return to full use of my knee, I began
getting recommendations for good sports medicine doctors. After an MRI and a quick but definitive physical exam,
I was told that I had completely torn my ACL and to return to full function and avoid complications later such
as torn cartilage and arthritis, I should have it replaced. I opted to due so.
The arthroscopic surgical procedure took about an hour and I chose a local anesthetic for most of it. The surgeon
used an autograft to replace my torn ligament by taking a section of my patellar tendon from the front of the same
knee. The surgery was actually the easy part of my return to full function. The challenging part was the rehab.
I was fortunate to have had a good surgeon using modern techniques, and was getting around on crutches the next
day, and limping on my own in a week. However, the muscles weakened so much after the repair and bruised during
the surgery that it took months for them to regain nearly full strength. This is even after working hard to condition
them
prior to surgery. I also had flexibility problems and some aches, pains, and clicking for over a year, but now,
after several thousand miles on bicycle, and many mountain summits, it is as strong and pain free as ever. I also
switched to snowboarding, and have never looked back.
For more information about ACL tears click here:
KNEE MODEL WITH ACL HIGHLIGHTED BY RED ARROWS
Pictures of Torn and Normal ACL from an Arthroscopic Examination of the Knee
ACL motion after reconstruction
