ok, so here is the story, about 4 years ago i tore my acl playing soccer and had to stop playing tennis. About 6 months ago i talked to some people and they said that it was pretty common that some people including themselves played with it torn. so i started playing again. everything was going fine until tonight. something happened. i can move my leg perfectly in all directions but cannot support my weight on it. so now i will probably have the reconstruction surgery on my acl in july this year. question is, how long after the surgery will i be able to play again. anybody who has experienced this help me out. thanx.
ACL Torn
- Thread starter zillianff
- Start date
Marius_Hancu
Talk Tennis Guru
read my posting at:
Great Fitness Sites
http://tt.tennis-warehouse.com/showthread.php?t=33800
Check Knee section
for Larry's ACL site
suggest posting there
Great Fitness Sites
http://tt.tennis-warehouse.com/showthread.php?t=33800
Check Knee section
for Larry's ACL site
suggest posting there
Marius_Hancu
Talk Tennis Guru
zillianff said:
Yes, something got garbled. This is the right link:
Larry's ACL injury site:
http://olarryrknees.homestead.com/acl.html
I suggest you check the other sites too, esp the first one,
http://www.factotem.org/cgi-bin/kneebbs.pl
MegacedU
Professional
It's not incredibly long. They usually recommend it directly after you tear it. But i guess it depends on how you tear it. I used to play lacrosse which is just like soccer but with a stick so i'm guessing it's similar. It all depends on how much physical therapy you go through and how willing you are to get back on it.
Eight months to me sounds realllly long from the cases I've heard. Since you're young I'd say about 5 maybe 6 months.
Eight months to me sounds realllly long from the cases I've heard. Since you're young I'd say about 5 maybe 6 months.
Marius_Hancu
Talk Tennis Guru
couch
Hall of Fame
zillianf,
Sorry to hear about your injury. There are a few different ways to have the surgery and all have varying recovery times. The patella tendon graft is the longest to recover from but is supposedly the stronger graft and will last longer. The hamstring and cadaver grafts are less invasive surgeries and are usually easier to recover from but the grafts aren't supposed to be as good as the patella tendon graft. At least thats what I was told about seven years ago when I had my surgery. I had the patella tendon graft and it took me about six months before I was playing tennis at "somewhat" full speed. It seemed like it took about 9-12 months before everything was really back to normal.
Things have probably changed since I had mine done but I would say recovery time would range from 5-6 months before playing tennis at "somewhat" full speed and close to a year before you are back to near 100%.
Good luck with your surgery and keep us posted. If you have any more questions you can e-mail me at k.mcadams@insightbb.com
Sorry to hear about your injury. There are a few different ways to have the surgery and all have varying recovery times. The patella tendon graft is the longest to recover from but is supposedly the stronger graft and will last longer. The hamstring and cadaver grafts are less invasive surgeries and are usually easier to recover from but the grafts aren't supposed to be as good as the patella tendon graft. At least thats what I was told about seven years ago when I had my surgery. I had the patella tendon graft and it took me about six months before I was playing tennis at "somewhat" full speed. It seemed like it took about 9-12 months before everything was really back to normal.
Things have probably changed since I had mine done but I would say recovery time would range from 5-6 months before playing tennis at "somewhat" full speed and close to a year before you are back to near 100%.
Good luck with your surgery and keep us posted. If you have any more questions you can e-mail me at k.mcadams@insightbb.com
Marius_Hancu
Talk Tennis Guru
couch said:
One of my GFs had a hamstring graft done somewhere in Scandinavia. After several months, her knee was't stable, had to go through surgery again.
There seem to be two schools of thought amongst surgeons, based on the sites which I posted. Some are advising immediate load on that leg after surgery, some are contrary to it. Based on my research and own experience with ankle surgery, I advised against. However, she followed up on advice received from her surgeon (which she changed for her 2nd surgery, at least that!) and started to walk with crutches putting weight on it after one week.
I would've advised at least a month of not putting weight on that knee, in order to have the graft adhering to the surrounding tissues. That she later got instability in the knee as a result of what she did was no surprise to me.
zillianff said:
I think this depends on how bad it's torn. IMHO only you can determine how much you can and cannot do. I don't really like to advise people on whether or not they should have surgery, since I am not a doctor and I think that is something only they and thier doctor can agree on. I do suggest that you make sure you find the right doctor though if you do decide to have surgery.
In my case having ACL reconstruction surgery was the best thing I ever did and I am very thankful for the doctor that did my surgery.
Here is my story:
I tore my ACL playing softball at 33 (12 years ago) and continued to play a couple more years by keeping it braced, but I could only play infield and had to alter my running, I would round the bases real wide. My speed wasn't affected, but I couldn't put on the brakes. Any ways after going to the wrong doctor a couple of times during those first few years I was only rehabing the leg to strengthen the mucles around the knee, but of coarse no rehab is going to repair a torn ACL. Swelling and soreness was tipical any time I played. I finally had my knee buckle bad and torn the miniscis(sp) cartlidge, so I decided to look into surgery. As I said In my case having the surgery was the best thing I ever did, I am very happy that I picked the doctor I did to do the surgery. Today I play tennis 3 or 4 times a week and only experience soreness in the knee occasionally. I don't even ware any brace at all now and don't even really think about my knee any more. Please keep in mind though for every success story like mine there are probably just as many nightmare stories where people are in awefull pain the rest of their life. I will admit that most people I know that have had knee surgery are quite a bit older than you and are not in the best shape to begin with.
So if you decide to have surgery, good luck! And if you are religous, I would definetly pray a lot about it.
Superior_Forehand
Rookie
What a horrible thing to have happen. Is there anything you can do to prevent this in the first place?
Marius_Hancu
Talk Tennis Guru
Superior_Forehand said:
Conditioning of your legs. Work hard your quads and hams, esp.
Rackethead
Rookie
Keep your weight to a minimum, of course there will be a tradeoff with power but then again it will also help the power-to-mass ratio up to a point. If you weigh less, there is that much less impact on your joints with every step, start, stop.
Marius_Hancu
Talk Tennis Guru
Rackethead said:
yes, very important.
Marius_Hancu
Talk Tennis Guru
Tennis-Specific Limitations in Players with an ACL-Deficient Knee
some of you might be interested in this:
http://www.stms.nl/april2004/default.htm
(select the article from contents)
Tennis-Specific Limitations in Players with an ACL-Deficient Knee
Javier Maquirriain, MD, PhD., Orthopedic Dept, Centro Nacional de Alto Rendimiento Deportivo, Buenos Aires, Argentina.
some of you might be interested in this:
http://www.stms.nl/april2004/default.htm
(select the article from contents)
Tennis-Specific Limitations in Players with an ACL-Deficient Knee
Javier Maquirriain, MD, PhD., Orthopedic Dept, Centro Nacional de Alto Rendimiento Deportivo, Buenos Aires, Argentina.
