Modern Vespa

Anyone have experience with knee replacements? I'm about to have my first one, due to arthritis, and would like feedback about how the surgery has affected others in respect to scootering and other physical activity.

Right now, I can't see that it would change my riding life, except for the better. I'm having trouble putting my GTS300 up on its center stand - something that was never a problem before. I feel like my knee will give way.

My other passion is snow-shoeing and I'm really worried I'll have to give it up.

Thanks for any input.

The general rule is, once your surgeon has cleared you for it, you can resume any activity, including scootering and snow shoeing. This depends on how quickly you heal and how well you do with physical therapy. Time for this is usually between two to six months minimum. Some people take up to a year to completely recover all range of motion without pain or stiffness.
You should be pain free with the center stand issue once you've healed up.

Your Physical Therapist is your friend, listen to them.

Thank you, but I need to hear from someone with experience - I'm not looking for advice.

I've been a registered nurse for 19 years, and have dealt with many an orthopedic knee replacement patient. But if you're looking for someone's personal experience, that will have little bearing on YOUR experience.

Everyone responds to pain differently, and everyone heals at different rates.

I had my knee replaced Feb 12 2010. I went back to work on June 1. I started riding the end of May. Riding the scooter was fine but my motorcycle is a problem. Having my leg bent in the same postion will cause stiffness and swelling. I teach the MSF courses and have the same issue . It is still alot better the it was prior to surgery. The doc says every month will improve. Im glad I had it done.

With all due respect to your profession, I'm not looking for information from medical professionals (unless they've had the procedure). Believe me, I've consulted enough doctors to know what the 'general rule' is.

I'm well aware that everyone is different, and I need to learn about others' exeriences.

CRICKET a good orthopedic surgeon will advise you as to the odds of it "taking" because of your arthritis. It will be different if you have osteo vs rheumatoid arthritis. Do you have bone issues or cartilage issues? There's a new thing coming in a few years that is really cool. They take some of your own cartilage, grow it and then replace it. 8) No need to worry about anything taking or not taking. While most knee replacements do well if you have one that doesn't "take" your in trouble since they can't put your old knee back in. I need them in both knees but will live with it until i can't walk since my odds of it taking are only 60% Me personally, think those odds aren't good. I have a side stand on the LX and while i can't do the things i used to i have other things i do now. However for the people that i know who have had the surgery and it went well, they were back to normal in no time. You have to be 100% committed to the physical therapy regime and you'll do fine. I throw out the cons because surgery doesn't always work and i think people should look at the "what ifs". Hope this helps. Good luck

I had a replacement a little over a year ago. Surgery was a breeze. They told me 3 days in hospital, a month of at home rehab. They had me up two times a day walking, the next day. For the time I was in the hospital, and three or four weeks afterword my leg was in a machine that slowly and continually bent my knee. I would adjust it to the max bend I could stand. At home I sleep all night with this machine going. I pretty much had full motion of my knee within two months, I was riding the scooter within a month.
You have follow and do all the exercising they tell you to do, more if you can. It was painful for a few weeks, but the outcome is worth it. The new knee is as good as it was in my younger years. By the way, I'm 68 yrs old.
Most people that I have talked to that have problems - limited motion or pain - didn't follow the physical therapists instruction. Basically the old saying "move it or loose it".
Hope this answers some of your questions - go for it.

Best, Jack

my 78-year-old aunt had a knee replacement two months ago. She was walking the next day, and apart from a bit of lingering swelling and stiffness (which should go away within a few more months) she's delighted with the result and has recovered nearly all of the normal range of motion very quickly. apparently there was surprisingly little pain. she has been very diligent with the physical therapy which has contributed enormously to her recovery.

Another 'second-hand' reply:
A friend of mine has recently had one done and is due for the other soon.
He's 69 but quite fit.

He told me on Monday that he had a bit of trouble getting back to normal as the muscles had wasted somewhat over time (before the op) so he was building up the other leg with the exercises in preparation, hopefully, to recover more quickly after #2.

I dont' have first hand experience with having a knee replacement, although I've cared for many patients pre and post knee replacement in my practice. I just wanted to say good luck with the procedure. I do know people who were very debilitated by their OA of their knees who were then back to a much greater level of activity post knee replacement. I would expect that you'd be able to ride and even snow shoe again afterwards. Everyone is different, but generally speaking the activities you're concerned about shouldn't be a problem. I know you didn't really want the opinion of another doctor, but there it is for what it is worth. One of my patients just had a second knee replacement and is very glad that he did.

Thanks for the feedback, everyone. What worried me is that many of the articles I've read about it, on-line and in the doc's office, suggest I take up golf instead of hiking, which to me is like trading my golden retriever for a goldfish.

It's encouraging to hear from people (older that me, even!) who have had good results. My mother, with two new knees and a hip, is almost immobile. I don't want to end up like her - but then again, she admits she didn't follow through on the physio therapy as well as she should. And she wasn't very active in the first place.

Three months without riding though! I'll pray for a wet, cold winter.

Yes, it'll be tough

But as they say about growing old,
"consider the alternative!"

Since everyone is different, collecting anecdotal reports of individual experiences is literally useless.

With that logic, you're saying that support groups are usless. Please butt out.

Since when is MV your personal advice line where you can demand specific responses to a problem and dismiss any other contributions for not satisfying your requirements?

I have to agree.

Incidentally, I've been recovering from knee surgery I had last year, but it's probably not exactly the same as what you will be looking forward to, so I won't bother you with the details.

However, you may find this useful.

http://www.missmanners.com/

What you're asking for does not have anything at all in common with support groups. If you want to discuss this further, we can go offline to discuss why I think I have sufficient expertise in this area to make this claim and on what I base it.

You ask for personal, first-hand reports from riders who've had knee replacements. What are you going to do, count votes? ("Totally go for it!" "Run away!") That's fine, but won't tell you anything whatsoever about what it will be like for you, which is really what's important here. It can only ever tell you what it was like for them. Statistically speaking, you're not likely to find more than a handful of people on this board with this first-hand experience, so you're not going to get many votes.

You've specifically rejected well-informed data from more than one person here with access to large data sets. This aggregate information is likely to be much more useful in helping a person make an informed decision or to make reasonable predictions about what to expect.

I have not had a knee replacement. I will likely need one. My dad recently had both his done. He did not make any decisions or predictions by collecting opinions from strangers on the internet. He talked with one of his sons who is a physician and the other who for many years was the biomedical engineer in charge of evaluating joint replacements for the FDA. He talked with his experienced orthopedist. He talked with close friends who'd had the procedure. He had the replacements and almost nothing went as expected or predicted. The personal experiences of others did not help him with predictions.

CRICKET, MATT is a DR and he's right. Please make sure you go into it with the knowledge that you can come out of it much worse. I know you want to hear that everything will be alright and so far the surgeries have been positive on here but that's not always the case.

Your words... but yet anyone with input based on multiple "second hand" professional experiences is summarily dismissed.

As I see it, you want to make your personal, life-altering decision based on the input from a series of unknown people who have ONE (maybe two) first hand personal individual experiences for a procedure where the results range from complete freedom to wheelchair confinement.

I would think that includes RN's and Doctor's.

I think that probably the OP was just looking for
a little moral support from fellow sufferers

It would be foolish to seek medical advice here
for anything but your garden variety scooter accident