BeanoNYC
Active member
ALLSKIING said:
First off the Surgeon was excellent! If anyone on the Island has a sports related injury and needs an orthopedic surgeon, PM me.
I got some good news. He says that surgery is not needed immediately. I suffered a significant level III shoulder separation, but nothing can be done right away to fix it. He wants me to stay in a sling for the next two weeks until the swelling goes down. Once the swelling goes down he'll reevaluate it. In a perfect world I wont need any surgery and will have 90% of my range of motion back in
4 - 6 weeks.
Physical therapy will not start for at least another two weeks. "Those pain mongers will have to wait because it won't do you any good right away and just discourage you"
I'm impressed that a sports orthopedic surgeon with physical therapists on staff didn't push for either surgery or PT right away.
He says I could be back skiing in 4 - 6 weeks as well! He suggested that I keep it to groomed terrain and nothing requiring major pole work.
I'm taking my first day off from work this school year today to switch back and forth between ice and warm compresses. I feel guilty about it but I think I pushed myself a bit too much yesterday at work. The students were extremely supportive yesterday and helped me out in anyway they could. I was impressed that they didn't try to take advantage of my vicoden induced haze. I got my lesson on the Battle of the Bulge out with no problems!
Anyway ... thanks for your kind words and thoughts, fellow AZers. I'll keep you posted on the progress.
Oh, as an aside, he told my wife that he was prescribing a bell for me to ring should I need anything at all. He said she seemed very caring and was confident that he wouldn't need to do a "bell extraction" on me in a few days. He was also talking into his tape recorder and said "patient's wife has been informed, not to let him ski for at least 4 - 6 weeks." I like a doctor with a good personality, it adds to the whole healing process.
