I am sure there will be some things that I will have to watch, learn to compensate for. But, with it hurting so much now, and being so fearful of turning it wrong on uneven ground and pain that will put me flat on the ground if I step on it wrong, I think I will be able to deal with things like your friend has. My ankle will be a little more complicated as there is the main ankle joint, then a small space/joint in the heel area that helps with side to side stability on uneven ground. They don't replace that , it will be fused. So I will be restricted to no weight bearing until that fuses. If it was strictly the ankle joint, dr said they would have me up and doing the next day. My therapy/rehab will be structured for no weight bearing until it fuses. Don't see any sense in doing one and not the other as the small joint area will need to be done eventually. Said it might be 6 months or 5 years before it starts to hurt too much, but why go through 2 separate operations, and down time. Just do it all at once since it is in bad shape now. He says that I have only about 10% of use of it now, so won't notice that small difference, and with a pain free main ankle joint I will learn to compensate for that stability issue. Have had a couple of these drs reccommended to me at Duke by people from here that go there for their care. I chose this one because he is progressive and into things like stem cell and such and was hoping that was a route to try. But he said it was just in too bad a shape and since stem cell is not covered by insurance, that he couldn't see reccommending something that I would have to pay for out of pocket if he just didn't think it would help. He said I could try it if I wanted, but with all the other "alternative treatments" I have had, and he was well versed in what I was explaining to him, that he felt I had exhausted all my options and it was his opinion that the replacement would be my very best option.
Glad your friend is doing well with is. They say the rehab/physical therapy is a bytch for the first few weeks, but that everyone that has stuck with it has been pretty happy with the results. Have a girlfriend that had 1 knee done this past year, and is going to do the other this next winter. She said the first couple weeks were rough, but is glad she did it as now it is just much better.
