Kelsey: I’m incredibly confident in my knee that had the BEAR implant. I don’t notice when I’m out there skiing which knee was the one that went through surgery.
Kelsey: My name is Kelsey Wittles, I’m a big mountain and free ride skier based out of Truckee, California. Big mountain skiing is exactly what you imagine when you imagine a ski film or something like that. It’s usually taking one of the gnarliest faces on the mountain, and they put the judges at the bottom, and they say, “Ski down it and we’re going to judge you on how you ski it.”
I was skiing at the resort with a bunch of other really great skiers, and we were going off this big cliff and doing tricks and whatnot, and I went off it and crashed. And the way I crashed, I twisted and I heard my knee pop. I felt the pop, and I went to put pressure on it and immediately knew I had torn my ACL.
Dr. Hagen: When I saw Kelsey as a patient, I saw her tear and thought she’d be a good candidate for the BEAR implant. And that’s when I just presented it as an option, and I let her do a lot of her own research to see if that’s what she wanted to do.
Kelsey: This was really attractive to me for a lot of reasons. I wouldn’t have to take a graph from somewhere else on my body. So, I wouldn’t have another surgical site to heal. I understand my body, and I know its ability to heal.
As an engineer, I understand the application of force, and I understand the forces I’m putting on my knee and my ACL. And I know that if I allow my body to heal itself, it can respond to those forces in a more succinct environment rather than just pinning something into place.
Dr. Hagen: The BEAR implant is a collagen implant that creates a healing environment that allows your natural ACL to heal where it normally does not heal. I often recommend the BEAR implant for my patients because I work in the Tahoe community, where we have a lot of skiers.
So, what’s great about the BEAR implant is it allows you to repair their native ACL and you’re also not doing additional trauma to their knee by taking a graft from that same knee. You’re restoring their own anatomy, and ultimately, that’s what we try to do in orthopedics is maintain someone’s own anatomy and so that it retains the nerves within that ligament.
Kelsey was a great candidate for the BEAR implant because she’s a professional skier that needs the most natural-feeling knee.
Kelsey: I think, like any ACL recovery, it’s a long process, and you have to be ready to put in the work. I started to feel it responding, and I started to see that there was potential that I would be able to get back to how I felt previously.
Dr. Hagen: She took her rehab very seriously. So, she followed the protocol. As soon as she was cleared for a new activity, she would do it.
Dr. Hagen: The whole reason I went into orthopedics was to help people get back to their activity level. For Kelsey, that’s really high. And it’s been awesome to see her get back to skiing at such a high level.
Kelsey: It was terrifying when I tore my ACL, and I thought my career could be over. I’m incredibly happy I went with the BEAR implant because I feel really strong, and I’m really excited, and I feel really confident going forward with my pursuits as a professional skier.
