Anyone ever had a "Sports Hernia" aka: "Sportsman's hernia", "Gilmore's groin", or &quot

I spoke to a surgeon at Upenn - Dr Harbison. Considering moving forward with him but still trying to rule out a hip issue. Let me know if you find anything out please!

Hey all,

getting surgery in Pittsburgh next week - left side w/ adductor release and inguinal nerve cut.

What do I need to know?

For those who went the surgery route, how did the rehab go? How long was the process? I had both sides done a month ago, but the groin pain on one side has already returned with just light jogging, maybe 10 mins of running total. Have any of you experienced this? The Dr. said not to worry, it will be a 2-steps forward, 1-step back type of rehab. I'm concerned the surgery didn't fix the problem as the pain has returned after only a few weeks on very, very light running.

Here's my story...

In April, I woke up with pretty bad testicle pain. I had been doing some boot camp classes and think I might have hurt myself doing sit-ups or maybe spinning. Figured I pulled something and it would go away with rest. It obviously didn’t, so I went to see a doctor.

I got diagnosed with a hernia at first, but then a surgeon told me it wasn’t a hernia and probably just a bad groin strain. Since then I’ve had an ultrasound and a CAT scan that both came back clean. Have an MRI scheduled this week.

Also went to a spine specialist to see if it was something with my back, but it wasn’t. My Urologist suggested doing Pelvic Floor PT, which I’ve been doing for a few weeks now. My testicle pain is still the same, probably between a 2-5 pain, and hasn’t really changed at all in the past 7 months. Groin in general is like a 1-pain. I can run, but it's always sore afterwards.

I’ve seen so many doctors and was hoping the PT would work.

I’m at a loss. It’s been 7 months of dealing with this and just don’t see the light at the end of the tunnel.

Anybody have a similar experience? Can this be a sports hernia? If so, any good doctors to see in the Chicagoland area to help diagnose it?

Boatknobs, I am experiencing similar pain. I am four weeks post surgery and have only been walking 3-4 miles/day. I attempted the elliptical last week and pain returned in the same areas that it existed pre-surgery. Could you tell me if your pain has started to subside since then?

Here's my story:

I am a 33 year old male distance runner. I recently had breakthroughs at the marathon and half marathon distance (2:26 and 68). In May, I saw an acupuncturist who performed some strength tests on my body. It aggravated my groin because that evening on my run I experienced pain for the firs time in my groin. I tried training through the pain for two months because it was minimal. I finally had an MRI in July which revealed an active core muscle injury with tear of the midline pubic plate extending into the left rectus abdominis-adductor aponeurosis (aka sports hernia or athletic pubalgia) as well as mild bilateral cam type FAI morphology. I then tried two months of PT and rest. When I returned to easy running the pain returned immediately.

I then realized surgery was necessary. I decided to go with Dr. Harbinson from Penn Medicine because I did not want to front the cash for Dr. Meyers. I had an open-incision mesh procedure completed on November 9th. After surgery I began gradually building my walking distance each day from a half mile to 3-4 miles over the course of a couple weeks with minimal pain. At the four week mark I tried easy jogging and the elliptical but the same pain I had experienced pre-surgery returned almost immediately. I then took a step back and began PT and limited walking and cycling. At this point I am 10 weeks post-surgery and any time I perform aerobic work such as cycling, the elliptical or limited jogging I experience pain which then aggravates my groin/adductor area as well as my lower back for a few days post workout. At this point I believe my surgery was unsuccessful because my pain is worse than it was pre-surgery.

I was wondering if there was anybody who had a similar experience and if it got better over time? Or if somebody had a procedure completed with Dr. Meyers after a failed mesh repair? If so, was the surgery with Dr. Myers successful.? Any input or suggestions are appreciated.

Yes. Surgery was the only thing that solved the problem for me.

Uncle Pervy wrote:

Yes. Surgery was the only thing that solved the problem for me.

Uncle Pervy, thanks for the quick reply. Did you happen to go through Dr. Meyers for your second surgery?

I made a thread posting this, but it was suggested to post as well to this thread as it seems to be a running thread and consistently posted on.

I recently had bilateral, open, inguinal mesh repair and I thought I’d provide some insight on my experience. I scoured the internet and countless pages for months regarding my injury, and then again regarding surgery once the surgeon offered it. I figured I would write me experience because I’ve gotten so much information from other’s.

A little background, I did not have an actual hernia. I am a 29 year old distance runner who suffered from a combination of a few things; Hip dysfunction, athletic publagia, sports hernia, Gilmore’s groin, etc. They are all pretty related but kind of indistinguishable due to the lack of research in male groin injuries. Anyway, had pain for months, saw a sports doc, did PT for 3 months, no change, saw another doc, then a surgeon, then surgery.

To be specific on what the pain felt like, it was in the inner thigh adductors and lower abdomen, and where they meet at the pubic bone. Sometimes it would radiate through the hip crease, sometimes north to the belly button. Intense myofascial massage would help a little; but it felt like I was at a 6/10 pain when I woke up, some movement brought it to 5/10, some massage to 4/10, then I would wake up the next day back at 6/10. As that went on for a while, I knew something was wrong internally and it wasn’t just a normal injury. Any abdominal innervation hurt, but getting out of bed, and hip extension while running hurt bad, and coughing/sneezing were excruciating. Complete rest got rid of it, but it came back. Oddly enough, almost zero pain biking, but everything else was bad. Start to Surgery was about an 10 month ordeal.

The procedure is the Lichtenstein tension free mesh repair. It was my first surgery, but the surgeon was fantastic in comforting. If you are reading this, have chronic groin/abdominal pain, and live in the Midwest, Dr. Keune with SLUCare Surgery is fantastic. From what I recall, he basically reinforced the internal oblique and transverse abdominis with mesh.

Post-Op

Days 1-3 – pretty terrible to be honest. I could barely lift my foot off the ground, I was shuffling, moving anything cause pain. Was on pain meds, which were helpful, but sleep was almost nonexistent in this period due to the physical stress. Sleep got better each day though. Extreme fluid drainage as well as swelling, so I had some serious abdominal distension in the area. Ballsack looked like a catcher’s mit.

I was starving following the surgery and the doc said that’s very odd for abdominal surgery, so he said ease into a diet. I was back on normal diet by that night. **DO NOT DO THIS** try to stay liquid and high protein (shakes, chicken broth, etc) for at least day 1-2. The slowing of the GI tract motility, along with the opiods causes some constipation. The day my bowels began moving again was more painful than the surgery itself, you cant push because of incisions. There was more poop in the toilet than I have ever seen in my life and I wept on the toilet in pain for about 20 minutes.

Day 4-6 – Still some pulling/tugging sensation, from time to time youll get a jolt of pain shooting down your leg to one of your testicles, but appetite is now back in full force, bowels are moving, incisions still tender, and legs still tight. But I did begin walking here and started at 15minutes at .5mph on the tread. Each day your stride gets a bit longer.

I also stopped pain meds after my first bowel movement, and pain here has been minimal, but still there.

Day 7-13 – Seems like mental clarity is back, able to walk normal, able to sit and stand normal although with some tightness and slight pain. Swelling is down, incisions look sealed but there’s glue over them so I cant tell. Walking more, and more, stairs are no longer an issue. I have not pulled or pushed anything heavy, but probably wont for another 2 weeks or so. Hydration and protein is still high for internal wound healing, but overall I feel normal. Lets say week 1, I felt like I was hit by a train. Week two feels like I hopped out of a slow moving car.

If I remember to update this, maybe a month post op, I will. Today is 14 days, some slight pulling sensations, almost like im wearing too tight of underwear. Other than that, everything that caused pain in the past two weeks, ie getting in and out of a car, sitting and standing, lying in bed, etc. is gone.

If any questions, happy to help.

I'm trying to figure out if this is what I have. A couple of weeks ago I noticed that when I first started a run, literally pushing off the first few steps, I had tightness and pain in my right pelvic area that felt like it was in that vague groin/abductor/hip flexor area. After a half mile or so it seemed to warm up and the tightness and pain went away. Well now it's still doing that but I also notice other symptoms. If I put my feet together and push them together it hurts in the same region. If I hold a medicine or bouncy ball between my knees and push inward it also hurts. I can't pinpoint a specific spot and the pain seems to move around on me. I can jump on one foot with no pain and the pain doesn't get worse as I run, it seems to get better.

Does this sound like what you all have experienced? It feels like tendonitis to me but I'm obvious worried about a sfx possibility.

My pain/tightness only really occurs during the first few minutes of a run, really the first few steps. Any ideas what could be going on? It gets better during the run.

Bump

Whoever comes across this forum & this thread and reads it in search of answers.

Whatever you do - DO NOT go to Dr. Brown in Fremont, California.

His procedure is a made-up, non-researched, not thought through procedure that will permanently harm you and disable you beyond your wildest dreams.

He knows his procedure is bogus. He knows it makes no sense from a muscular or anatomical point of view and continues to do it for the money.

I understand he is attractive as a doctor because he presents himself as genuinely concerned and doesn't price gouge like Dr. Meyers or some other doctors, but there is a reason that absolutely NO professional athlete goes to him.

His tactic to make you feel special or trusted is he will personally call you on your phone, he will give you his cell number and tell you you can call him at any time (Meyers also does this, its a predatory practice to gain patients' trust and make them feel special).

DO NOT cheap out on your health. Consult MULTIPLE people, go to well-established hernia surgeons that don't necessarily deal with sports hernias because those doctors have integrity and an actual method to their practice and if nothing else they will rule out EVERY OTHER possible cause and pin point your issue.

I am a professional athlete, I was injured but functional - it was more of a nagging pain that wouldn't go away and was told that eventually I'd need surgery so when I had some downtime I decided to make the jump. Meaning I had pain and it got to the point of being intolerable but I could still utilize my muscles & what not. I went to Dr. Brown because I thought he cared and knew what he was doing.

He made things 100x worse and created so many permanent issues that I didn't have that I literally can't function as a human being since. Its been almost 2 years and I can't even breathe properly, walk properly, cant flex my core AT ALL since his procedure. I was a lean, no fat athlete with seriously well conditioned muscles & tissues and he destroyed my entire life in 1.5 hours after telling me I was the perfect patient for a surgeon with my body composition and condition.

He is a con man. He pretends hes been doing it for 30-40 years yet has 10 reviews total which makes no sense. Go to any well-established hernia surgeon, they have reviews by the hundreds and you can find proper information on them.

The only thing Dr. Brown has going on for him is that he purchased the website sportshernia.com in the early 2000s which any person can do and presented himself as the specialist of the condition when he doesn't understand the first thing about how muscles function and interact together and what you can and can't do to them. He does cool facial sculpting/cosmetic procedures as part of his practice too because he doesn't have enough dumb clients to butcher through his sports hernia practice to sustain his business. I'm sick to my stomach just thining about it. I know of at least 10 other patients like me that never wrote a review but that got destroyed by Dr. Brown - one of which apparently ended their lives.

Please if you only take one thing away from this whole thread - DO NOT GO OR SEND YOUR KID/ATHLETE to see Dr. Brown. He is winging it. He's a fraud. He has no idea what he's doing and the consequences of his procedure. And most importantly, he does not respect any agreement or boundaries set by the patient prior to agreeing to surgery.

If I can save even one person through this message then so be it.

I think I have this but it is just the nagging type at the moment. After reading through some of the horror stories in this thread I think I'd rather take up a different activity than get the surgery.

This is, in one way or another, true for all the famous "sports hernia" doc. Meyers and Muschaweck, too. They don't even give rehab protocols after their "repairs"...or at least they didn't back when I got worked on them.

Even the hip docs just say "your pain is due to the hip problem you have, and I can fix your hips, so I can fix that groin problem, too!". But at least the hip docs tend to take their procedure VERY seriously and have legit rehab protocols. Doesnt mean it will fox your groin (it didn't for me), but it at least comes OFF a lot less snake oily.

Fernando: spend a few weeks doing Bulgarian squats. Just try it. Depending on your situation, it may well eliminate, or nearly eliminate, your symptoms.

As always, that's my advice for everyone who visits this thread. Bulgarian squat. Spend sometime with the lift before you do any cutting or major money spending. You could well be surprised by the results...what have you got to lose, it's not like I'm charging you money for this advice. Off the bat that may make me at least marginally more trustworthy than any of the docs you got are (especially the "big" names).

Hello all. I would like to share my "sports hernia" story in hopes that it helps somebody avoid the many years of suffering I endured.

In 2008, I felt a pain in my left lower abdomen after playing basketball. I was at the gym for several hours most days playing ball & lifting weights so I figured I pulled a muscle or something. Went to the urgent care & they said nothing was wrong. Keep training as usual they said. So I did.

The pain continued to get worse & worse over time so I made appointments with multiple doctors, specialists, etc. to figure out what was wrong. After a bunch of doctors & scans said nothing was wrong, a local doctor said I had an inguinal hernia & needed surgery to repair it. Being young, naive, scared & in pain, I had the surgery that this doctor claimed would be the solution to my pain. An laparoscopic inguinal hernia repair with mesh.

Not only did I not get better after this, my pain increased SEVERELY & I couldn't do anything for months. I had to lay in bed all day in my early 20s, only leaving the house for doctors appointments to continue the search for what was causing my pain. Of course, the inguinal hernia surgeon acted surprised when I complained of continuing pain. He pumped me full of narcotic pain medication & told me to deal with it.

I researched all I could & ended up on this site, in this thread, reading about sports hernias & the doctors who repair them. At this point I had seen well over a dozen doctors & had several different scans, tests, physical therapists, medications, etc. to no avail.

I made an appointment with Dr. Demetrius E Litwin in Worcester, MA for a consultation & after driving halfway across the country to meet with him, he told me I had a sports hernia & could either take several years away from activity or have a "repair" surgery with him that he felt would solve my problem. Being young, naive & anxious to get back to sports & life I opted for the exploratory surgery he recommended.

This surgery left me in even more pain than the previous & I was horrified at how much worse things had gotten. Of course, pain is to be expected after a major surgery, but I'm talking months/years afterwards, I was still in more pain then when I started. I would drive all the way to Worcester to meet with him for follow-ups & he did not even show up! Instead, sending an assistant to meet with me. When I called the office about the continuing pain, they told me to "rub some icy hot on it." My experience with him & his office was beyond disrespectful. I wouldn't wish it on my worst enemy & truly believe he is an evil person.

Instead of recognizing a pattern of surgeons mutilating instead of helping, I continued to place trust in the traditional medical industry & sought out yet another surgeon mentioned many times in this thread: Dr. William Meyers. He helped all of my favorite athletes with their "sports hernias." What could go wrong?

I drove again across the country to his office in Philadelphia for a consultation. He had scans done & told me what I did indeed have a sports hernia that was improperly repaired by Dr. Litwin & he could fix me up with a surgery. Not only that, but I needed to have the mesh removed from my first surgery as it was all bunched up & causing even more problems. Also, the scan showed a sports hernia on my right side too, not just my left!

Of course, he recommended I get both of these "sports hernias" repaired, but since it would be too painful to do both at once, I should instead have two separate surgeries with him, for over 10 grand each! Oh & he doesn't work with insurance either so that's out of pocket.

Broke due to what was now a physical disability preventing me from working a job, in constant pain & also in debt from college degrees & multiple failed surgeries, I was desperate enough to buy Dr. Meyers' sales pitch. I was also very fortunate to have my parents be able to pay for these surgeries. So let's get them scheduled & get back to living, right?

Wrong, the scan the scan also revealed a labral tear in my hip that needed to be repaired first. Of course, his good buddy Dr. Struan Coleman in New York was the guy I needed to see, said Dr. Meyers.

Wow, Dr. Coleman was the team doctor for the New York Mets! Impressive. I was sure nothing could go wrong with a guy like that, so I booked an appointment with him in New York City & once again, drove across the country to see a surgeon.

Of course Dr. Coleman was certain he could repair my hip tear & make my pain go away. So I had the surgery. Not only did he "repair" my labral tear, he cut my psoas muscle to "lengthen" it too while I was knocked out. Of course, this resulted in several more months of rehab & no relief from the pain. They were happy to pump me full of narcotics every time I followed up to complain about my pain & ask what to do.

The lengthening of the psoas muscle that was done as part of this surgery may be the worst of them all & caused MAJOR problems as now my left psoas is much looser & longer than my right, which is of course, unnatural. It took several years of specialized psoas work with a massage therapist, intense stretching routines, pain & tightness to even get things back to "normal," which I doubt they will ever be.

Anyway, after Dr. Coleman mutilated me for a lot of money, I went back to see Dr. Meyers because I was still in pain (now hip & psoas pain too). It still didn't occur to me that I should stay away from surgeons, because my whole life I was taught that if you have a problem, you go to a doctor & they fix you.

Dr. Meyers performed the "sports hernia" surgery on my left side & assured me that this was the answer to my pain once & for all. It wasn't. He even gave me his "personal" phone number to call if I had any problems! Wow. Not realizing this is a predatory tactic to gain patients' trust, I felt special & that he really cared.

When I called him with pain & questions he told me to "grin & bear it." To work through the pain instead of resting. Of course, this didn't work so he prescribed me some heavy drugs with nasty side effects to get through it. When those didn't work, he had a brilliant idea - that I should come in for another sports hernia surgery on my right side!

Embarrassingly, I still didn't realize what was going on & went in for the second surgery with Dr. Meyers. This was my fifth surgery in just 3 years & again, it only made things much worse.

At this point I still had the initial pain that started everything in 2008, but now I also had chronic hip pain, psoas pain on one side, psoas tightness on the other, abdominal pain on BOTH sides, testicle pain, major scarring internally & externally, pieces of synthetic mesh inside of my body, major debt, destroyed credit, physical disability preventing me from work, severe depression & the feeling that I was crazy because I was still in pain after having operations with the finest doctors in the world who were telling me to "put some icy hot on it" & to "grin & bear it." Oh & I had an opiate addiction now too which my local doctor was happy to keep going by prescribing hundreds of pills at a time with multiple refills.

It was a foregone conclusion at this point that I would be permanently disabled with chronic pain for the rest of my life & the best I could hope for was to manage the pain. Local doctors had me convinced that shooting me up with numbing drugs & steroids would help, but of course those only made my legs go numb & caused sciatica which I didn't have previous to the shots.

Despite this extensive paper trail, I was denied disability by the state because the lawyer I hired to help me with the application made a mistake that caused me to look like a fool at the hearing in front of a judge. Ironically, he still sends me bills for this "work."

In a last desperate attempt to find a solution, I went to the Mayo Clinic & saw multiple doctors about my situation. One said I was crazy & needed to do an expensive course with him to fix my head. Another said that I should have my right hip operated on, because it was the only thing that was left un-mutilated. I didn't have to do it right away, but if I didn't do it within a few years, I would be in a wheelchair. Of course, I didn't do it & I'm not in a wheelchair.

The last doctor I saw at Mayo was not only the only one to tell me I didn't need a surgery, he insisted that I did not get anymore surgeries. His name was Dr. David Farley & he told me that he sees hundreds of patients each year who have failed sports hernia surgeries from doctors like Litwin, etc. & that he feels surgery is not the answer to this problem the majority of the time. He said the unfortunate nature of this injury & the human body is that it just needs a lot of time to heal. My life would have turned out a lot different if I had heard this in 2008.

Over the next few years I started studying nutrition & eliminating processed foods from my diet, which helped the pain tremendously & began the healing process. Unfortunately this led me down a rabbit hole of extreme raw food diets in an attempt to fully heal & while they did help initially, they caused more problems than they helped in the long run.

I also studied the work of Dr. John Sarno which was quite a revelation & helped me a lot.

Ultimately, it took several years of healing aka not getting surgeries, staying FAR away from doctors, eating a healthy diet, stretching, not overtraining, re-evaluating how much exercise is healthy (I no longer believe that endurance sports are healthy) & understanding the principles of John Sarno's work before I was able to consider myself healed.

I'm not the same as I was before this started of course, that was 13 years ago, but I'm finally strong & fit again, able to work & workout & do what I enjoy without pain. The experience totally changed me as a person for the better, but I wouldn't wish it upon anybody.

As a fellow human, I absolutely beg anybody who reads this to stay as far away as humanly possible from Dr. Litwin, Dr. Meyers, Dr. Coleman or any other doctor who suggests having a surgery for a "sports hernia."

At the very least, try eating right, resting & checking out Dr. Sarno's book first. The Great Pain Deception by Steve Ozanich is another great book to read. There's nothing to lose with this approach & if it doesn't work you can always go under the knife later & buy one of these doctors another new car.

I had it may 2020 I was a good runner 120 miles a week never got injured. I had it so bad it was very painful sneezing and I couldn't sit up to get out of bed. Please don't get surgery you're have permanently molested your body and it will never heal naturally and be unfixable. After a year I can run again and I stopped doing pushups which helped a ton. Now I'm back running 90 miles a week.

Thanks for your testimonies guys. I'm about 6 weeks since undiagnosed, but almost certain AP (all symptoms) and after reading these threads and one one reddit, I stopped running (it was too painful to run at all anyway) and have been working on various exercises, primarily Bulgarian split squats, as recommended by multiple people. I've replaced running with jumping rope which seems to work well as lower leg strength/ endurance is maintained/ developed and you can basically replicate running tempos, intervals etc once you can co-ordinate well enough. The symptoms had gone, and the split squats were asymptomatic until I slipped a few days ago and seem to have torn a bit, but was aiming for another 2 weeks until a tentative test of running. I'll post back in due course as to whether it's working or not, but so far the advice of avoiding surgery and undertaking these exercises to correct the root issues seems promising.

Update: Today I did the 4x 400m at 8' pace at the 8 week point since trying to deal with this without surgery as per the rehab program in the link below. That went ok - there is a little comfort, high awareness of risk, but core stability and glute activation close to eliminate the symptom now and this comes from a starting point 8 weeks ago where I could not run as the pain was so severe. It's too early to call success, but it is progress in line with the program and as I had expected to 'fail' the test due to two slips in the last couple weeks that I think set healing progress back 3-4 weeks, and also as I have been ad hoc'ing the program as I don't have access to gym, I may be making less progress than I could otherwise. The next two weeks of the program seem impossible without gym equipment, so I may have to improvise something, but I can say at this point that it seems highly credible and worth pursuing before ever considering surgery. Additionally, on the same site is a decent comparison between mesh repair and minimal repair and the advice is overwhelmingly to avoid mesh and go for the latter if surgery ends up being unavoidable.

Other notes - the jump rope has kept aerobic fitness high - I'm doing 60mins a day running on spot mainly at equivalent to an easy tempo, and I think lower leg/ foot strength has improved (perhaps due to shorter ground contact time and the calves having to absorb/ generate a higher proportion of load than running). At this point, I am tempted to reintroduce easy runs, maybe some days, hard running, sprints, hills would seem risky as there is still fragility, so I may err on the side of caution and wait 2 weeks more. I will update again, but thought this was worth posting for anyone finding themselves in this situation and I am deeply sorry for everyone that has gone through these horrific ordeals with surgery and thank you greatly for your testimonies.

https://physiqz.com/physical-therapy/sports-hernias-athletic-pubalgia/orthopedic-clinical-review/#Sports-Hernia-Treatment-and-Rehabilitation-Program