American ski star Lindsey Vonn, who suffered a horrific fall in the Olympic downhill in Cortina, on Monday thanked the doctor who saved her leg.
Vonn posted a video on Instagram including graphic images of her injury and a surgery video, saying she had been discharged from hospital.
Vonn suffered a set of fractures in her left leg in the fall on February 8.
“Everything was in pieces,” she said.
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She underwent a series of operations in Italy before returning to the United States where Tom Hackett, a Colorado-based orthopaedic surgeon who works with the US ski team, performed a six-hour operation and “saved my leg from being amputated”.
She said, the injury had caused “compartment syndrome” which put her leg at risk.
“When you have so much trauma to one area of your body that there’s too much blood and it gets stuck and it basically crushes everything,” Vonn said in her post.
“Muscle, nerves and tendons all die…
“He cut open both sides of my leg, filleted it open. Let it breathe, and he saved me.”
The 2010 Olympic downhill champion came out of retirement last winter after almost six years away and had found impressive World Cup form this season with seven podium finishes in eight races, including two victories.
A fall in January then left her with a damaged ligament in her left knee, but she still went to the Olympics.
“It’s been really hard and not the way I wanted to end the Olympics,” she said, tearing up.
“But it’s been inspiring to watch my team-mates.”
“No regrets,” she added.
“I worked so hard to get back and this year was so worth it. It was one blip on the radar.
“I was in the hospital a little longer than I hoped, because I had low haemoglobin from all the blood loss and I was really struggling with the pain which was a little out of control.
“I can’t tell you how painful it’s been.”
Vonn, who has 84 World Cup race victories in her career, had been hoping to win her fourth Olympic medal.
“I’m finally well enough to move to a hotel. It’s not home yet, but it’s a huge step!” she wrote, but also added that she could not yet walk.
“It’s gonna be a long road. I’m in a wheelchair right now because I also broke my right ankle.
“Now I will focus on rehab and progressing from a wheelchair to crutches in a few weeks. It will take around a year for all of the bones to heal.”
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