Wednesday, December 18, 2019

Update 2019

After 14 years, my ankle arthritis came back. however it has been a great ride during all these years with very limited pain. I got married, we got 2 kids, I was able to do so many activities that would not have been possible without my ankle allograft (skiing, roller blading, hiking and many other). As we love traveling, we did several trips of 2 to 4 weeks long, but decided we wanted more. In 2013 we spent 1 month in Europe and 2 months in Thailand when our kids were 2 and 8. We loved it so much that we decided to do it for longer, and in Dec 2014 I left my job, we sold all of our possession and left the US for 5 months in Europe, then 4 months camping on the US national parks, then 9 month in South East Asia, and finally back to Europe, the Caribbean and finally back to the US in Jan 2017. Some of our adventures can be found on mylittlevagabonds. This amazing travel would not have been possible without my new ankle, and during the adventure my ankle started t show sign of wear, and pain slowly came back. That was one of the reason to come back to the US, as I know that a second surgery would be an option if my ankle didn't get more damage than what it had previously. After settling back in CA, getting a new job, going through some unexpected family events, I finally get in a position to focus on my ankle. Here we are, after a visit to San Diego in August 2019, I made it to the waiting list for a donor. After waiting anxiously for the call, my surgery was scheduled for Nov 20 2019.

Wednesday, July 15, 2009

quick status of my surgery

Slide 1
Surgery Status

Surgery: 4.5 hours, on Friday 1/7/05, under full anesthesia
-Fresh right ankle graft from a 16 years old male
-Prefect dimension fit
-Allograft fit at first try, pretty uncommon
-Small bone in the ankle broke during surgery, fixed
(bone may have been damaged from previous accident, however, braking of this bone happen in about 10% of transplant)
-Total ankle clean up (from bone residues, scare tissues, …)
-Good recovery at the hospital, in cast
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-Flight back home from San Diego on Sunday night (1/9/05)
-Doing very light Physical Therapy until next doctor visit (1/25/05)
-Under medication (antibiotic and pain medicine), sleep a lot
-Need to keep leg elevated, move from bed to sofa on crutches

X-RAY pictures

Sunday, June 7, 2009

Independant Medical Review of Benefits

As many people asked me what had been covered by my insurance, I decided to post the final stage of the story.
I will probably post later the whole story as well as the huge file I collected to fight the insurance company decision.
After my surgery, BC decided that they wouldn't cover some of the cost associated with me ankle allograft. After a long fight, the last option was to present my case in front of DHMC, an independent board review system.
Below is the result of the review (click on the page to it display full screen).

Saturday, June 6, 2009

My new blog

I had an ankle allograft in January 2002. The results are fantastic and I have been sharing this wonderful success with many through e-mail and other ways.
I decided to start this blog to make my experience available online, to share the success and incredible outcome of the procedure with others and to provide support to people who are in the process of having to choose a solution for their ankle problems.