Does anyone ride with a torn ACL?

Can you get by without fixing it??? What risk is there???

I'd appreciate any good insight on this. I tore mine this summer and after a couple weeks off, kept riding, gingerly, for the rest of the year. I figured it was just strained and would get better when I quit riding for the winter. Finally got an MRI done and sure enough, the black line where the ACL should be is just a fuzzy haze of grey.

It has gotten progressively better in that it doesn't bother me unless I put decent lateral stress on it. Does anyone have any experience with just trying to strengthen it and wear a brace to avoid surgery? Is that a bad idea or will it work? Is the 5-6 month surgery recovery time worth it? I have a very good Orthopedic doctor, but he is very curt with his explanations, and did not shed much light on this decision before showing me the door, so thanks in advance if you have any thoughts...

You tore your ACL? What trick/when?

Dave Brisco told me this summer that he no longer has an ACL on either leg, but he can still ride...not sure if that tells you anything.

I would really reccomend looking into a sports therapist if you haven't already, I know a great one in KC if you need one that does a lot of stuff for the Royals and Chiefs (I went to him for my sprained MCL two summers ago...remember that day?). They will usually be able to explain to you exactly what is going on, recovery, and give you a REALISTIC idea of what you should and shouldn't do, they are surrounded by knee injuries all day.

Sorry, I don't have a lot of meaningful feedback for ya, but this post caught me by surprise, good luck with recovery Matt.

Hey Matt tore my acl in 2000. After the pain subsided it didn't take long to get back on the water. Did't lose to much range with forward and back motion but I need to be very careful with side to side. Walk on the beach to try and strengthen the muscles around the knee. Now almost 6 years to the day, I should have gotten the surgery. Do it now while winter is here. Recovery time seems to be getting shorter and shorter.

Reid

If you don't fix you risk injuring the rest of your knee

I learned to wakeboard without an ACL. You just have to make sure that you do wakeboard specific exercise in addition the rehab workout(proprioception and alot of hamstring strenghtening)

There is a risk of wearing down your knee joint early, but I scoffed at all the naysayers when I opted not to have my ACL repaired after the initial injury.
10 yrs later (nonwakeboard related) an incident required me to have my ACL repaired, the articular surfaces of my knee joint were clean and smooth. No evidence of early arthritis.
Search the thread and you'll find much more answers to your question about ACL reconstruction

Here's my personnal experience ... I totally ruptured my ACL while wakeboarding 8 years ago and damaged the meniscus at the same time. My surgeon at the time decided that the best course of action was to fix the meniscus and leave the ACL alone.

8 years down the line I had to undego a pretty tough surgery as my cartilages eventually gave away ... They also did a DIDT to repair the ACL at the same time as my MOSAICPLASTY ... You should know that riding without your ACL will eventually lead to cartilage wear , arthritis , and that there are no guaranteed surgical procedures that can really fix your cartilage ... surgeries are only some kind of temporary patch!

I'm now 8 weeks post op and only starting to walk again ... rehab is pretty tough !

Nick

Another note on this comment from Reid :"Recovery time seems to be getting shorter and shorter"

ACL repair be it with DIDT or KJ is a minimum 6 month beofre return to normal activity with sports involving rotational knee movements ... any earlier return is suicidal as the graft will only be back to full strenght between 6 to 8 month ...

You can go without an ACL and not have arthritis or further injury. Your chance of not injuring your knee again is not great but you can do it. As others have said prior you must strengthen the muscles in your legs and specifically work on motions that you encounter while riding. You actually increase your chances of arthritis once you have surgery. I would recommend using a knee brace if you do not have your ACL fixed to limit any unnecessary stress on the knee.
Your graft is healed within 6 weeks. That is strictly the bone plugs healing. The biggest part of your recovery is rebuilding the muscle lost post surgery. The 6 months varies from person to person. If your aggressive with your rehab and don't overdue it then you can shorten your recovery. I was released within 5 months. And that was without a brace. I opted to get a brace for personal mental relief.

"Your graft is healed within 6 weeks. That is strictly the bone plugs healing"

There are many things to consider during the healing process. Bone plugs is only one of them and yes it will take six weeks to heal... however the ligament replacement in the case of a DIDT is a tendon that will eventually become a real ligament thru revascularisation. The strenght of the replacement is maximum when it is still a tendon then becomes really fragile 4 weeks post surgery and will only recover full strenght between 6 to 8 month post operation ... you can always start activity before full healing but it is not recomender ...

Rehab and working out will prevent further injuries but will not accelerate the healing ...

If you want real medical advice search the web, ACL repair is one of the most common surgical procedures ... you'll find all the info you need , pros and cons regarding surgery/arthritis ...etc ...

Statistics I have been given show that 80 percent of athletes with a torn ACL go on to do further damage to their knee eventually requiring surgery and increasing arthritis and other issues. I also think recover time depends on what else was damaged and how invasive a surgery it is. I am pretty sure you could ride well before 6 months, I just wouldnt go out and jump back into your same old trick run. I would take things slow until those 6 months are up and your knees are strong.

FYI there is some more information here:

http://www.wakeworld.com/MB/Discus/messages/1/389799.html?1164770597
http://www.wakeworld.com/MB/Discus/messages/1/392546.html?1164990042

I delayed fixing my acl and eventually had an allograft done and meniscus removal. Because I waited years to address the problem I will end up with a total knee replacement. Do your homework and find the best surgeon in your area the time it takes to fix now will out way the result of not doing it. FIX IT NOW.

I just injured my ACL in October and after two Orthos reading my MRI and examining my leg (manual tests-lachman, anterior drawer and pivot-shift) am pretty sure it is a partial tear but with enough stability to try the conservative non-surgical approach. I am rehabbing it at PT and am getting fitted for an ACL brace. My second ortho does wotk with several pro teams in the area and gave me a 75% chance of not needing surgery if I rehab it well and wear the brace for the first 1-2 years. It is coming along well and I am able to run, bike, do jump drills, and lateral slides so I am hoping it works out and I can ride by spring. From what they told me, the success of a non-surgical treatment definitely depends on the specific degree of laxity in your knee and how well you rehab it. Good luck and sometimes a second opinion helps get a different perspective on your injury.

get it fixed and get it fixed right, ive been told that my new acl is much stronger than a normal one. he claims the other will blow before the new one, i put a brace on it anyways as precaution and that brace has saved me on more than one occasion

I know it's not ACL, but I blew my MCL on June 18th. Next week I was headed to Radar lake to ride with my buddy (Ronix Northwest Rep). I was in some nasty pain, but had the opportunity to ride a Ronix before it entered the world. I rode and couldn't even do much with an expensive Don Joy brace. If not for the opportunity, I wouldn't have got on a board for 3 months. Take care of your body if you want to ride for a long time.

Kevin is right. Get it fixed or plan on a lifetime of problems.

You all are great. I truely appreciate this first-hand advice. Of course I've been digging through the archives here, and looking at med sites on the internet, but you all are the ones who have already encountered the experience and dealt with it wakeboarding.

So far, the concensus seems to be that I should do the surgery, because, while I may be able to squeak by for a while and not injure things further, it is a risk that is not worth it.

You know, when I was still riding on it, I learned what would hurt it and what wouldn't, and basically I just had to be really consciencious of how I landed, and try to stay w2w without casing it. So its tempting to think that I could learn to deal with it/protect it and get by with just a brace, but it seems like everyone here that has tried that has wished they hadn't.

Plus I play basketball in the off season, and that's what convinced me to get an MRI - almost every game I tried to play was cut short by my knee giving out when I cut the wrong way or landed on it wrong. It would hurt like a bitch for an hour or so, and then be stiff and sore for a couple days before I'd try it again, and end up in the same place all over. What's the definition of insanity??? Plus you know I'd try something new or go too big one day and really blow it out wakeboarding.

But I DON'T WANNA BE OUT 6 MONTHS!!!
But you all know the feeling, and made it through alright...

Garret - it was while taking a morning session on cedar valley res. before the Garnett tourney. I was having a killer set and the boat was SUNK so it was a lot of fun. I just got lazy and landed a scarecrow a little off the front and straight-legged and POP OUCH! A dumb-ass scarecrow. I mean honestly.

You went to Dr. Barnthouse for your MCL too right? And used his therapy guys?

Matt, thats EXACTLY how I did mine just a little over a month ago. Just warmin up late october, I ended up taking the scarecrow a little bigger than normal and over-rotated. I remember looking down after having the rotation completed thinking, "ahh ish, straight knees and another 3 ft before I land, plus all my weight is on my front foot" Felt a pop and that was it. I immediately got in the boat and started "testing the knee" I almost took another set thinking that it wasnt that bad.

I remember hearing someone say that if you ride on a torn acl and proceed to "blow your knee" again the results will be catastophic since that is one less ligament holding things together. But I just heard this statement, I am not sure how valid it is. Seems a little logical though.

Get the surgery. period. You risk ruining the rest of your ligaments, meniscus, and have very high potential for bad arthiritis and an ultimate knee replasement as you get older.

YOur confidence will be greater and you will be able to push yourself again once you recover. The brace will feel good too. Be well and do your rehab. I'm 4 weeks post mcl tear. It sucks but is feeling a lot better.

Matt,

when you say "almost every game I tried to play was cut short by my knee giving out when I cut the wrong way or landed on it wrong. It would hurt like a bitch for an hour or so, and then be stiff and sore for a couple days before I'd try it again, and end up in the same place all over" that's exactly how it felt for me ... it held like this for eight years and then 2 month ago the knee gave out once more only this time it wasn't the same story anymore , I fractured my cartilage ...

A regular ACL surgery will take 6 month to get back on your board, add the cartilage and you're delaying everything 6 more weeks as procedures on cartilage mean not walking for a good period of time until the bone/cartilage graft has taken ...

Email me if you need info : nick at nicolasleforestier dot com