Hole in Knee cap after first surgery

[Ingrid Fiehn]

My daughter had a surgery on both of her knees one year ago. Her left knee is in excellent conditions now, while on her right knee she continues with severe pain.

So one year ago, we did an MRI on her knees, which resulted in a soft and VERY lose cartilage under her right knee cap. The doctor, through arthroscopy, did three small drillings in her knee cap, which would cause bleeding, which would help in making the cartilage stronger and at the same time "paste" it back to the knee cap.....or so he thought....

The pain continued after the surgery, so after nearly a year of therapies and several evaluations, we did a new MRI, which discovered that from those three drillings that the doctor had made on her knee cap during the surgery one year ago, only one of them had completely recovered, while the other two drillings never recovered and created one big hole in her knee cap. The hole looks like a triangle.

So now, the doctor says that her knee cap is in danger of breaking, and has to make a new surgery to refill this hole. I have so many doubts on my mind, but I guess tha main question here is which is the best way to go?

[Brandon123]

Sorry to hear about your daughter's struggle, ongoing knee pain is frustrating indeed. Drilling behind the knee cap (patella microfracture) is known to be difficult. The patella cartilage is the most difficult place to perform cartilage repair in the entire knee. If possible, I would suggest that you get a second opinion from another orthopedic surgeon before you agree to any more surgery, just to be sure she is getting the right treatment. I am suggesting this because it is not very easy to "refill" the hole that was created from the failed first surgery.