Doc Elrod and I

Dr. Elrod was recommended to me as the premiere knee guy when I ripped my acl skiing in '91. After 17 years, I saw him again yesterday.

If you're a Tennessee Titan's football fan, you've probably seen Dr. Elrod running out on the field to attend to injured players.

My reason for seeing him yesterday wasn't the left knee he repaired (which has been perfect), it was the other that has not been feeling right since Jan.

It took him just a minute to determine that a clunking in my knee may be a loose cartilage flap. To be sure, I will get an MRI tomorrow (Friday).

I was really impressed with his medical clinic - the Elite Sports Medicine and Orthopaedic Center.

Dr. Elrod told me that even though today they use absorbable materials' instead of using titanium staples and screws to affix donor acl ligaments like he did with my left knee in '91, he said my acl surgery in '91 was 10 years ahead of its time because it was done arthroscopically. My left knee has an acl donor replacement ligament- an allograft. At that time, it was revolutionary surgery. The donor ligament is actually an achilles tendon which is structurally much stronger than an acl. The knee has been perfect ever since.

Doc seemed interested in my own prosthesis - the classical guitarists fingernails - particularly the thumb nail that employs a superglued piece of ping-pong ball - odd as it sounds, it is a standard and widely used device among classical guitarists.

Note: I have not been posting very frequently here at Bill's TN Paradise, but with all the political news lately, I've been posting a lot at my politics blog: TN Canon.