A Life of Words

Saturday marked one year since I tripped over a recliner in our dark living room about 3 a.m. while carrying our new Wheaten terrier puppy Win-Win outside, falling forward hard on our laminate floor and fully fracturing my right femur just below the hip joint. (Sadly, we don’t have Win anymore because of her many behavioral issues, but we adopted a sweet Havanese puppy named Archie last October.)

Late that same morning at Methodist Mansfield Hospital, I underwent surgery and was gifted a cool titanium rod and screws to stabilize my femur while it healed as I went through several months of physical therapy.

BTW, because she didn’t want me to be alone in my leg-breaking fun, my niece Lew broke BOTH her left tibia and fibula after slipping in the snow in Colorado while walking her dog in late January. Then, in early March, Kay’s brother Corky fractured his right femur in the same area I did while skiing with his family at Mount Hood. Not to be outdone, he shattered his into **12** pieces!!!

So, you ask, how’s MY leg doing a year later?

Well, the break has healed, but my leg isn’t back to where it was before I fell April 26, 2024. I’m still having pain, but not a ton. It’s not unbearable, just a nuisance when I’m going on walks and even sometimes when I’m just getting around, like from the parking lot to the office.

Let me explain what’s been going on.

By the time I went for my 7-month checkup with the orthopedic surgeon in November, X-rays showed the fracture had fully healed. Whoop!!

But …

My surgeon – appropriately named Dr. Au (rhymes with “ow”) – said that was the good news. The bad news was that another condition had developed around my femur injury site. It’s called heterotopic ossification (HO), and the minute he mentioned it, I knew exactly what it was because my communications teammates and I at UT Southwestern Medical Center have produced news releases covering HO research by UTSW faculty.

You can research this online if you’re interested, but in layman’s terms, HO is when new bone grows in soft tissue (not connected to the skeletal system) where you’ve had surgery, trauma like a broken bone, or a neurological injury. It can happen after hip or knee replacements, in the elbows, or after spinal cord or traumatic brain injuries. Even though it’s common, it’s anything but normal – we should not suddenly have bone growing directly into tissue.

During my last visit with Dr. Ow – I mean Au – in February, we discussed options. It’s likely the pain I’m still having is due to the HO, but sometimes patients like me will have pain from the installed “hardware” itself. The doc could remove the rod and screws, now that I don’t need them anymore, and he could also take out the abnormal bone jutting into the tissue. He says in Europe, it’s fairly common practice to remove orthopedic hardware after the bone heals, but doctors don’t often do that in the U.S. From what I’ve read online, that’s mostly because there are risks and potential complications with that surgery. Of course, there are with any surgery.

But since it’s safe for the hardware to remain, why chance it? Plus, there’s no guarantee the HO won’t return if he goes in to remove the new bone growth, and I’d rather not have another surgery if I don’t absolutely need it. I’ve lived with chronic low back pain for over 30 years and chronic headaches most of my life, so I figure I can put up with some leg pain.

We decided I’d go back to the physical therapist for a few weeks and see if that helps. However … because of some recent flare-ups with my back pain, I’ve had to cancel 2 appointments to get that started (I’m seeing a new spine specialist at UTSW about THAT issue). I plan to call this week to give the PT another go. Fingers crossed!

So, happy one-year femur fracture anniversary to me!!