Johnny's Recovery-NO KNIFE

After sustaining a knee injury that required for surgical intervention while in high school, I struggled with recurring ailments throughout my intercollegiate career. It was not until my father, who is an Osteopathic physician, was performing manipulation on me did we begin to diagnose the potential causes. The issue was muscle imbalance and limited flexibility in certain areas of my body that was shifting majority of my weight onto my knees while performing certain movements. This went unnoticed by physicians because while performing examinations the scope was concentrated on the immediate areas around my knee. With the knowledge I obtained through manipulation I have been able to treat my knee ailments by strengthening and lengthening muscles throughout my body. Having this experience helped solidify that if I am to be the physician I aspire to be, it is imperative to be trained in this form of medicine.

Tommy John Surgery comes at a time when the athlete’s life is spiraling into complete chaos. Just as it stabilizes the elbow’s bones together it stabilizes the hopes and dreams of the athlete’s future. Without the invention of this surgery numerous people had their purpose renewed and the disorder cured.”Disorder, alas, is the natural order of things in the universe.”(RFW pg.420) Tommy John Surgery sorts out the turmoil.

Life can change in a split second when an unanticipated injury or disease hinders someone’s normal daily life. Modern medicine, physicians and families can only do so much but physical therapy can help recoup the life many of us take for granted. It often isn’t until we lose something that we as humans realize what we had such as the value of our body’s ability to take us through each day. A physical therapist is the person who stays with a patient for the duration of the rehabilitation process. A physical therapist leads the patient through the process of regaining physical strength and helps the patient regain control of their future. Much like many careers that involve interaction with individuals, physical therapy reaches beyond

OrthoOklahoma is an orthopedic medical clinic with a physical therapy branch that provides outpatient physical therapy care. The facility has a staff of three licensed physical therapists and a physical therapy assistant along with four physical therapy techs. I was able to observe all three physical therapists, Megan Ripley, Joe Ogle and Ken Roberts. At OrthoOklahoma, the most common patients are post-surgery from repairs of muscles, bones or joints. While shadowing these therapists, I observed cases of total knee replacement, total hip replacement, ACL/meniscus repair, rotator cuff repair, frozen shoulder, labrum repair, and other ailments from wear-and-tear and aging. This experience allowed me to talk to physical therapists about the ins and outs of their job, learn about different exercises and routines for treatment of injuries, and really get an idea of the work it takes to become a well-respected physical therapist.

These topics and my interactions with clinicians in our lab have driven my interest for pursuing the specific area of orthopedics. From back injuries, Tommy John surgeries, broken feet, and a prosthetic leg, my family has also had a lot of experience on the patient side of this specialty. The chance to rehabilitate athletes, such as my loved ones, is appealing, but I know that these injuries are not exclusive to this population, and my true passion lies in the opportunity to rehabilitate individuals in underserved populations. My time in Guatemala and Nicaragua has really grown my heart for people living in the impoverished countries of Central America. My first mission trip there largely contributed to my passions for becoming a doctor and since high school, my career goals have been aimed at building the skills necessary to serve those communities. Eventually, I would love to be able to marry my interests in global health and orthopedics, and incorporate my biomedical engineering background, to contribute to research aimed at optimizing care and medical technologies in low-resource settings. As the leader in global orthopedic initiatives, UCSF and the prospect of working with the Institute for Global Orthopedics and Traumatology stand out

In Drew Marcos presentation, were first introduced to one athlete, in particular, Tommy John, an American professional baseball (left-handed) pitcher, who permanently damaged his ulnar collateral ligament in his pitching arm, leading to a revolutionary surgical operation. known as Tommy John surgery. It replaced the ligament in the elbow of his pitching arm with a tendon from his right forearm. The surgery was performed by Dr. Frank Jobe in 1974. After the surgery, the odds were against John, since there was a 1 in 100 success rate for that operation. But, he took a season off to recover and worked with a kinesiologist, who taught him a completely different way to pitching, eliminating the chance of him hurting his knee and arm. Before his surgery he won 124 games after his surgery 164 games won, John continued to play for 14 more years, retiring in 1989. Marcos, went on to discuss scapular strength and positional impairments such as scapular dyskinesia, insufficient posterior tilt, excessive abduction and prominent inferior medial border, which are all factors that play a part in the inverted “W” pitching position; that Marcos believes, is one of the driving forces behind the some pitcher’s injuries and the Tommy

I interviewed Jimmy Johnson; he suffers from chronic pain from many years of work and hard labor. Jimmy was employed for 15 years at a factory that manufactures insulation; there he frequently lifted over 100 pound bags of material. After so much time had passed of heavy lifting Jimmy’s right shoulder tendons began to tear and fray terribly, which frequently happens to people who do hard labor over such a long period of time. Doctors performed surgery on Jimmy’s shoulder, at the age of 49 and left him with only ten percent of his arm and shoulder mobility and flexibility. The cause of his chronic pain is now due to the surgery and the tearing of his tendons in his shoulder: also, numerous other injuries he sustained over his lifetime. A time after his surgery he was prescribed Vicodin and today takes Oxycodone, which treats higher levels of pain than Vicodin. Without his medication of prescription pills Jimmy’s pain would be almost unbearable. He only takes the needed amount each day for his pain management and tries his hardest to not abuse the narcotic drugs like many do (Johnson).

Dr. Jeff Roderick is an experienced chiropractor who is certified in the Active Release Technique and trained in the myofascial release modality. He also holds an official Certified Chiropractic Sports Physician designation. Over the course of his career, he has served as a chiropractic sports medicine physician at the Salt Lake City Olympics, the team physician for the Madison and South Fremont high schools, and a chiropractor with Madison Ridge Chiropractic. While working for Madison Ridge, Dr. Jeff Roderick earned special recognition for excellent service and dedication to the chiropractic profession from the Logan College of Chiropractic.

Two years ago on a crisp October afternoon following school, I walked to the training room expecting a normal day for us. There would be the tapping of ankles, wrist, and thumbs, along with rehabilitation exercises and the whines and complains of athletes who would sit in the whirlpool for various injuries. After changing into sports medicine attire and putting my books up I was asked to take a framed object next door to the athletic director’s office. While patiently waiting for him to finish a meeting with

While shadowing Dr. Julia Shuleshko, I enjoyed witnessing the osteopathic philosophy in her practice, and how it led her to heal wounds better. She often described healing wounds as if it were a puzzle, and the best place to start was with any underlying health problems such as diabetes or circulation issues. I found it eye-opening that her default was to address the patient’s overall health as much as the wound itself. Her treatments utilized products to encourage tissue growth, but largely relied on the body’s ability to self-heal. She also implemented preventative strategies whenever possible—either through education or therapeutic methods. Her forward-thinking approach, grounded in osteopathy, was amazing, and inspired me to pursue a career

I was thirteen, and I had just come home from a school softball game. My friend Dalton had invited my sister and I to come and swim at the neighborhood pond. My sister stayed home, but I got permission to go. After a while of swimming, Dalton looks at me claims that he’ll jump out of a tree near the bank if I jump out. Of course, I accepted my friend’s little dare and climbed into the tree, focusing on the seven-foot-deep drop-off off of the bank. Regrettably, I didn’t jump far enough. My right leg landed in the drop-off, but my left leg hit the clay, which caused all of my weight to shift to my left foot. I felt an immense pain in my ankle and started screaming while crawling over to the bank as Dalton ran to get my mom. After I finally made it to the emergency room, I found that I had broken my fibula at an upward slant, which caused the upper part of the bone to slam down into my ankle.I had completely blown out every ligament and tendon on the left side of my ankle. I had to have a plate and four screws implanted into my fibula along with the surgical repair of all of my ligaments and tendons. The entire ordeal left me extremely interested in the human body, and this interest was heightened when I had to get my appendix removed a few months later and again when I took Anatomy and

Restoring function and movement after an injury in the quickest time possible is the aim of Dr. John Kotis. Many experts believe that working with a knowledgeable hand therapist after surgery is the key to a successful recovery after a traumatic injury or surgery. Hand therapy is the science of of evaluating and treating the upper extremities, which include the shoulder, elbow, arm, forearm, wrist and hand. Whether the patient's condition is the result of from trauma, disease, a congenital or an acquired deformity, Dr. Kotis is dedicated to serving the needs of his patients.

Balance of the human body is the secret to alleviation of internal and external pain and dysfunction. Understanding the possible underlying causes to a specific issue is the most important concept when beginning the task of “rebalancing” the body (i.e. daily activities, past trauma, congenital defects, sleeping patterns etc.). Once you’ve taken into account the possible and definitive subjective negatives, using an objective process of elimination and assessment will confer the ultimate treatment plan and goals. Certain aspects of actual implementation are majorly intuitive, although the basics can be easily explained. In other words, only through practice and experience using this modality can any one person become highly effective. The Table

With his approval, an acupuncturist at the hospital inserted and manipulated three long thin needles, one into the outer part of his right elbow and one below each knee. There was noticeable relaxation of the abdominal pressure and distension within an hour, with no recurrence of the problem thereafter. James Reston included a detailed description of his experiences with acupuncture in his dispatches from

Physical therapy has grown increasing more useful as the years’ progress and more is learned about the human body and its movements, interactions, and mechanisms. Someone may go to physical therapy for injury, recovery, in order to maintain function, or even due to a stroke and is trying to work on walking again. Patients of a physical therapist can include, but is not limited to, elderly, children, accident victims, athletes, those with conditions such as arthritis or fractures, etc. The possibilities are endless for potential physical therapy patients (Mayo Clinic School of Health Sciences).