High Tibial Osteomey & Microfracture

Hi Darren, I had the same thing last December so about 10 months ago. Worst couple of months in my life but once you get past initial stages well worth it.I was in a lot of pain before op but now much better. Couldn't do anything when on crutches as far as weight bearing for a couple of months. While i couldn't walk did a lot of leg raises, crunches and light upper body free weights and watched a stack of movies and sport on tv. Once back on feet was a regular at the physio for a while. Did some bike work as well. After about three months I was back into dragon boating, my sport because of the bad knees. Still hard to walk for a while. I'm over 50 so took me longer to recover. Have heard of younger people with same op recovering much quicker than me. Because they break your leg and take out a wedge it takes about six months for bone to properly repair. You only walk around because of plates and pins taking the weight. After that improvement is much greater. At 10 months I'm back in gym, boxing and paddling. Still some improvement left. You are probably younger than me so should recover quicker and it may take a little time but no reason you can't get back on the rugby field. Staying patient is the hardest thing with an osteotomy as you just can't do anything to rush it. Work hard and if you get too much pain back off and give it time. You'll get there.

Ken

Hello Bibble and welcome to PP- best wishes for your recovery.

What position do you usually play? My brother was a prop (is that correct? Is my ignorance showing? LOL) before going into refereeing and coaching.

And welcome Osteotomy, too, thank you for that helpful post :)

EB, kfitzgerald was talking about Osteotomies, not that he was one! i think if you're a forward you need to take a bit more care of the damaged leg and possibly delay your return to playing than if you're a back, due to the degree of stress on forwards' skeletal systems. Quite simply, its easier to run than scrummage with a weakened leg. If I was your coach, I wouldn't want to see you back at training before Christmas at the very VERY earliest, and I wouldn't put you back in the team this season (assuming your season ends in April). Sorry if this isn't what you want to hear.

Can you do non-weightbearing stuff like swimming and cycling to keep your fitness up in the meantime?

underway then I'd recommend a dedicated sports phsyio - you should get a hospital physio assigned anyway, but it's worth the investment in yourself to see a sports phsyio.