Patient Achieves Success with Revision Rotator Cuff Surgery with Dr. Gruber
Brian pictured here with his wife.
Brian Melotik is an engineering technician with Intel who has resided in Arizona with his family for 27 years. He lives an active lifestyle, and in his spare time enjoys sports, weight lifting, running, swimming, basketball and pickleball.
After having surgery to repair a torn rotator cuff with a previous orthopedic doctor, unfortunately Brian was no better off than he was before surgery. “Five months’ post-op I could tell something wasn’t right because I couldn’t lift my arm,” said Brian.
Brian decided to see Dr. Brian Gruber, board certified orthopedic surgeon, upon a referral from his family doctor. “Dr. Gruber really knows his business and is excellent at what he does,” stated Brian. “He looked over my original three MRIs and said that he needed another picture, with contrast, so we could get a better idea of the severity of the tear,” shared Brian.
Wanting to get a better idea how bad the tear was, Dr. Gruber ordered an MRI with contrast. It revealed a 100% tear in Brian’s rotator cuff. Dr. Gruber told him that due to the severity of the tear, it would require another shoulder surgery to fix.
“My previous doctor and surgery did not address the tear, but only did some cleanup,” said Brian. “I wanted to get better so decided to do another operation to repair the rotator cuff tear.”
Revision Rotator Cuff Surgery
“Dr. Gruber did my second rotator cuff surgery a year after my first one,” shared Brian. “Now, that arm [the one I had surgery on] feels better than the other arm,” joked Brian. He added that the surgery went very well and post-op recovery was great.
Brian did note that he was late starting surgery on his scheduled surgery date. It was due to Dr. Gruber’s surgery that was right before his, which took longer than expected.
“I didn’t mind that my surgery started late because someone else’s surgery ran late” said Brian. “It showed me that Dr. Gruber does not rush and takes his time with each patient to make sure everything goes well and that he would do the same for me, if needed.”
Brian started physical therapy with the Integrated Orthopedics’ PT team a week after surgery. “I did my PT with Jess, who is just great,” said Brian. “Jess took it real slow with me in the beginning and every week I could feel improvement starting at about the second week. She really knew what she was doing, and Jess and the whole PT clan over there are awesome.”
Brian said he wanted them to know how much he appreciated the team, so he gave them all Starbucks gift cards. “That’s how good they are,” said Brian. “I just wanted them to know they were appreciated.”
“I got the outcome I was hoping for – a new well-functioning arm. The only thing I’ve had to modify is not lifting weights all the way above my head,” said Brian. “I would recommend Dr. Gruber, Jess and the entire Integrated Orthopedics team to my family and friends, and actually already have.”