r/MACIknee

Not sure what to do hoping this Reddit forum might give me some ideas. I'm currently 7 months post op MACI on my medial femoral condyle. I also had an ACL reconstruction done 1 year ago on the same knee: everything went pretty well with the ACL but ever since I've had my MACI surgery I've been in so much pain. when I walk and bend my knee a certain way it catches, and certain PT exercises are painful. Sometimes I even have a sharp pain when just walking around. I can't run, squat or do any of that because of the sharp pain that comes from these activities. I feel hopeless. I haven't requested another mri from my doctor but that's my plan: I am a firefighter and feel like I won't be able to get back to doing my job if I have this pain. ive spoken to my doctor about the pain and catching and he is not helpful at all. Not sure what to do. Any suggestions?

It’s been about over a year and a half since I got Maci (I got both done 4 months apart) and I was just wondering if kneeling ever feels ok and normal again. Doesn’t bring me a lot of pain but it’s so uncomfortable!

Looking for some advice or guidance from y’all.

Had MACI on patella, single defect in January 2024. Since that, I also had 2 scopes to shave down cartilage overgrowth.. oh, and one pregnancy. Due to this, I’m quite behind on my recovery.

However, the last 5 months, I’ve been working hard with a new PT and started feeling stronger but there is still an almost constant pain there at the front of my knee right below my kneecap.

Had a recent MRI that showed cartilage still in place but some overgrowth again and there is a loose piece of bone floating around in of my knee. My doctor was not too worried about this. The MRI also stated there was a lot of scarring on the Hoffa fat pad. I asked my doc about this and he said he can see some impingement but again, doesn’t look “too bad”.

I just don’t know what to do anymore. I’m worse than I was before MACI and I don’t want to keep having more scope surgeries to “let’s see if this works” but instead a solid game plan on something that’s actually going to help me be active and pain free again.

My doc suggested waiting, having another scope, also offered revision MACI (I said hell no), OCA or OATS with TTO. I can’t even imagine going through another long recovery like this again. Looking at getting a second opinion from another doctor.

So I’m currently rehabbing from MACI (matrix-assisted autologous chondrocyte implantation) surgery and I want to know if the GLOW blend, consisting of GHK-Cu, BPC-157, and TB-500, would help with the healing process? (Or possibly hurt it?)

I’m currently two weeks in. This is my second attempt at the surgery. I had my other one previously five years ago and little background on myself I’m a former football player, decently strong guy having squatted 400+ or so even after the surgery. And was even able to come back and play football after the first surgery, I’m also currently a physical therapist, so I know I was decently rough on the graft and that’s something I could improve upon. I know the mechanism behind the blend seem theoretically like they would help. What are your thoughts on this?

So happy I found this group! I am one week post op, and honestly recovery has been great thus far. That’s not to say it hasn’t had its moments with tears involved haha.

Has anyone dealt with any weird nerve recovery symptoms? My op-leg and foot literally feels like it’s in an ice bath, but when physically touching it it’s normal temp. My ice machine also makes my incision hurt (it feels like when you touch a metal form to a filling in your tooth). Anyone else had these or similar?

Hi all,

I posted my story in this sub about 3-4 weeks ago, when I was 3 weeks post op. I'm now on post op week 6 and felt like dropping an update.

I'm doing partial weight bearing now, in brace, with crutches, about 75-80% of my weight onto the surgically repaired leg. It's pretty much pain-free in that regard. I'll probably be progressing to full weight bearing within the next week or two.

The joint is way less sensitive/reactive than it was since my last update. So that's good. I'm still trying to protect it from extension thru the PF compartment but otherwise it's not such a delicate thing any more.

The biggest challenge for me right now is progressing my range of motion. I'm able to get my passive flexion range of motion to about 90 degrees, but not past that. And my active range of motion is less than that. My physical therapist isn't concerned, though. He thinks it will come with some more time and continued work on stretching and everything, but says not to push it too hard at the moment. I was actually stuck at about 80 degrees for 1.5 - 2 weeks and then like overnight I was able to hit 90, so I guess that tracks....

Another challenge is just being committed enough to get all of the various exercises done every day, as much as possible. It's tedious stuff. Some days are harder than others. I've had a couple of days where I do the bare minimum, or maybe a little bit less. And some days I kind of go for gold. Ideally, I want to be more consistent. But you can't really go for gold every day. Most days I've been happy with what I get done. And all things considered I've seen signifanct progress since my last update on all fronts, so I think I'm doing something right.

Mentally, it's super challenging. I've always been active/athletic and it's hard to be laid up and disabled, especially since I've got two young kids running around the house and playing and enjoying life. I want to be able to do more with them but I can't right now. Really looking forward to being mobile again so I can have fun with my kids, hopefully without being held back by my old knee pain.

I think it's also mentally challenging bc you have to put so much faith into the idea that it's going to work, the grafts will take, the cartilage will grow, and that everything will work out when at the moment everything is so fragile and nascent and unknown. I try not to think about that too much bc I start to go a little crazy. The data is sound but at the end of the day it just feels insane that you have lab-grown genetically-identical chondrocytes implanted into your joint and they're gonna assimilate into your body. It's just... wild and kinda scary to consider all the possible outcomes.

I think this week I'm gonna get back to doing a little upper body weight training (seated). Haven't done anything besides PT and recovery stuff and my fitbit keeps yelling at me to be more active lol.

Anyway, thanks for reading. I'll post another update when the time feels right. Stay strong, everyone.

A few months ago I posted here about my frustrating, stalled recovery. I was given some good advice, mainly that 1) I'm not where I should be with strength and 2) I should consider a new PT.

It's now been ~14 months total (2 months since I posted) and I'm really pleased to say that things have turned around since then!

I first got a referral to a new PT. He immediately pointed out that I wasn't doing the exercises I needed to be doing at my stage in recovery. He said I needed to be doing harder stuff, and most importantly focusing on single leg closed chain exercises. My weighted leg raises and quad sets weren't enough. Unweighted bodyweight squats weren't enough.

He gave me an exercise which I feel really turned things around for me: Bulgarian Split Squat. It felt really difficult but not painful near the graft area, just more soreness if anything.

I would say within 6 weeks I was able to walk downstairs pain free. I've been keeping a pain diary and the improvement is really noticeable. Most activities are pain free now.

It's not all perfect - still a lot of stiffness and some general soreness. My lateral step-downs are still very limited; one step-height is about the max and very shaky. Snowboarding is probably another 6+ months away from being viable. But I'm getting there.

Anyway, just wanted to report back, send thanks for the good advice, and give some hope and pass on the positive vibes!

Me… again. Still struggling with my ROM. I’m now 11 weeks out, using cruches but putting weight on it. Endless amounts of leg lifts, albeit with that same pain on the medial side, can get a full rotation on a bike as of last week but cannot CANNOT for the life of me improve my ROM past 90 degrees. It just stops. It hurts, a lot, like an insane amount, but also just feels like a wall.

Has anyone struggled this much with ROM? What did you do?

4 grafts (3 pretty large) and TTO.

I’m also just getting a lot of weird pain these days. Like it’s more sensitive to touch, hurts on the outside and I get shooting pan down my tibia. I’m assuming a lot of that is from adding weight bearing?

In the UK you only really see your PT once a week and last week I was in NYC so it’s been a minute but I’m back to see him tomorrow. I hope he has ideas on how to improve ROM but so far hasn’t had much.

What the title says. I’m 6 months post surgery and still having so many issues. I now have an MCL strain and need to stop PT for a few weeks. It just feels like this entire recovery has been people throwing things at the wall and seeing what sticks; meanwhile, I still can’t walk without a limp. Every day im in discomfort - sore and sharp pains to the point that this has been objectively worse than the pain pre-surgery. I’m just sad and wish this was different.

I'm 13 weeks post surgery. I read so many posts here about this also being a mental strain, but I didn't think it would be for me. Joke's on me! My actual defect sites feel great! My ROM is fantastic. My issue is ongoing excess fluid in the joint that is causing me so much pain that I can't even sleep. I finally went back to the surgeon today because I couldn't take it anymore. He prescribed me a steroid pack to see if that would help calm things down. Has anyone else experienced ongoing pain from swelling and fluid? I really hope the steroids work because I feel like this is the only thing holding me back.

I can't believe my surgery was 9 months ago, 43F and very independent. It feels so long ago but at the same time, I feel like I still have a lot of progress to make. I had a large defect and this recovery is not for the faint of heart. I am a very active person and very impatient for things like this. While last summer got cut short, I'm hopeful to be doing my normal summer activities this year. I live near Philly, so many weekends are spent at the beach, concerts and Phillies games.

I had a hard time the first few weeks bending my knee. NWB for 3 weeks (probably would have been 2 but I was recovering at my parents shore house and had to push my follow up appt out a week). At 4 weeks I was able to get it to 90 degrees (thanks to a night out with some drinks haha). My surgery was on my right knee so at 4.5 weeks I was able to drive (being able to bend it enough was my problem not the pedals) and I only went to PT and the store to pick up groceries. I took 5.5 weeks off work and then worked from home for a while returning to the office one day a week and after the new year I came back to our required 3 days. I had a desk job so it wasn't returning to work. I definitely did enjoy not working for those few weeks...unfortunately still have a long ways to retirement haha.

Doing PT twice a week and still am but only once a week (mainly bc of insurance allotment). A lot of soreness and tightness through everything. It's finally letting up the past few weeks. I went back to Orangetheory around the 6 month mark and have been taking it very easy. My Dr still doesn't want me running or high impact stuff till 1 year. Started with some light polymetrics which hasn't been too bad.

A lot of people say to make sure you have strength in your leg beforehand. Consider we all walk around, most people probably do already, I don't see this being relevant. Its the after of keeping up the strength in your quad. This was not stressed to me especially at PT. In February, I got new PT people and the one guy right away knew what I was struggling with and said it's your quad. Started giving me exercises to do and another girl I have been working with really upped things too. I wish I didn't waste so much time and could be so much further along.

All in all, it doesn't seem bad now but the first 2-3 months were definitely rough. I did travel in early December for a work meeting. In the beginning of March, took a trip to Nashville. Thankfully it was not very crowded and probably all but 1 or 2 bars we went to, I was able to sit down some. The last morning there, I got up from brunch and definitely did something so it hurt and took about a week to recover from it. Mid March went to Clearwater for spring training. Did a bit more walking and definitely standing which wasn't terrible. The last 6 weeks, I definitely have felt the most progress so far. My walking without limping has gotten so much better and the other day I got out of the car and it wasn't until I was in the store I realized I didn't even think about my knee bc it didn't hurt. Hopeful I'm really on the up and up and things keep improving.