Surgery - Marz

Back when Marz was in 7th grade, her middle school took a trip to Bintan Island in Indonesia. While there, she bent to pick up a canoe, twisted and POP!  Something happened...  We never really knew the damage until 4 weeks ago when she re injured her knee at basketball practice. Her dorm mom took her to a very good orthopedic specialist in Penang. After an MRI the doctor found major damage to her femur and to a bit of her tibia. He was stumped as to what caused so much damag. He kept asking if she had ever fallen hard on her knee. No, we said. 

So I made arrangements to fly to Malaysia as we knew we could not put off surgery any longer. 

After a long day of waiting at the hospital, Marz finally went in (an hour late) and this what the doctor found...

They pulled 4 chunks of cartilage out of her knee. They all totaled about the size of a 50 cent piece. 

When the good doctor was in "looking" around he found that it was the patella cartilage, from the first injury, floating around doing the damage to the rest of her knee. 

The fix these days is to drill many spots on the affected bone area to regrow the cartilage. So he drilled in three spots to start the regeneration. 

She was still quite drugged! ;)

Marz is not allowed to put any pressure on her right leg for 4 to 6 weeks. She also can't bend it to walk with her crutches. It must hang straight. She is also doing physio therapy 3 days a week. Hopefully she beats the 9 month window for recovery! :)

On a positive note, I have been having lunch with Marz every day for the last 1 1/2 weeks!

Happy healing Marz!!  xoxo