Doctors at Wockhart Hospitals Treats 'Synovial Chondromatosis'

Imagine 98 small pieces of bone lying loose in the knee joint. That was exactly what happened to 60-year-old Arukkani Ammal from Tamil Nadu.

A victim of 'synovial chondromatosis', she had great difficulty in walking, climbing the stairs, sitting on the floor or bending her knee to full extent. After suffering the pain for over 10 years, she is back to her feet and walking freely again.

A resident of Karur in Tamil Nadu, Arukkani was suffering from knee pain on both her legs.

"Initially, when she had problem in walking, we attributed it to her age. Also we thought that due to incessant rubbing of bones, such pain may occur. Later, she noticed that her knee had started to gradually bend inwards," said her son Sarvanan.

Pain relieving balms helped her out once in a while. When consulted, pain killer pills were all that was prescribed to her by local doctors. A year ago, the pain became unbearable and Arukkani was brought to a hospital in Coimbatore.

"That was the first time I got to know my knee problem was something beyond arthritis. Nothing much was done in that hospital. Following an advertisement of Wockhardt Hospital, we came to Bangalore. I underwent surgeries here and within two days, I was able to walk," a contended Arukkani said.

She was admitted to the hospital on September 22. Two surgeries followed consecutively, on September 23 and 25.

"When we got her knee joint X-ray done, we noticed a few bony loose pieces lying in the knee joint and she was unable to bend the knee joint completely. While her right knee was severely affected with 98 small bone developments, on the left knee there were five such bone developments. However, her knee cap was intact," said Dr JV Srinivas, consultant orthopaedic surgeon of Wockhardt Hospitals Bone and Joint Care,Bangalore.

“This is one of the rarest conditions we have ever come across,” Dr Srinivas.The two surgeries, that took one hour each, helped her get back to her feet again.

"Her knee was severely arthritic too. So we decided to perform total knee replacement. On the operation table, when we opened the knee joint, we found 98 loose bone pieces like marbles that were ranging from 40 mm to 5mm. While most of these were loose, a few were attached to the synovium of the joint. Complete removal of the bone pieces was done and this was followed by total prosthetic knee replacement," said Dr Srinivas.

After two days, Arukkani was able to walk without pain and she enjoyed full movement at the knee. After four days, she was discharged and she went back home.

Source:Dnaindia.com