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

First of all , i want to cheer up ppl who have this kind of problems. Ive been through it and its been really stressing.

I live in Europe and im a M.D. in Plastic and Recontructive Surgery. I am by no means a professional athlete, but i used to play soccer twice weekly with my jobmates and friends.

5 years ago i started with some discomfort in my right groin, sometimes with a burning sensation that irradiated to the inner thigh and the scrotum. Since i work in a hospital it was easy for me to contact other specialists but i had the pain, constantly, daily, for 5 months and no one gave me a diagnosis (saw urologists, general surgeons, orthopedic surgeons)... conventional hernias were ruled out, same as epididimitis... we were puzzled and i was starting to get really anxious. Finally i met some orthopedic surgeon specialized in sports medicine (he treats players from the local soccer teams) and he diagnosed me of Pubic Ostheitis and i underwent surgery. In the procedure they found a small direct hernia that was reapaired. The recovery was a nightmare (took months to recover) but i ended without symptons. Ive been asymptomatic for 4 years now, and quite happy.

So the clue i think is finding someone who knows about this issue. Most physicians know nothing about sports hernias. Its a relatively new condition and not something they teach you about in MEd Schools. If you dont find the right person (and its not easy), you will be wasting your time in useless procedures.

So cheer up. There can be a solution. Just find the right specialist.

The problem with me is that these surgeons keep looking at my inginual canal and I think the problem is in my lower abdomen between the canals. These surgeons only know certain procedures and they think every other person is wrong.

more news for those having slow recoveries...

i went to a doc today who knows all about sports hernias, apparently. it took me a year to get into his office.

he said that bad sporrts hernias, especially ones that go a long time before sugery, can take 2- 3 years to recover. that is, if you have become deconditioned, imbalanced, and the pain/tear was very bad.

the best method to recover is to re-balance the muscles and compsenatory patterns. trigger points need to be addressed. manual therapy is a must, but best done by an osteopath skilled in manual osteopathy.

good thing that is the path i have been taking post-op. it has been a long troublesome road just like many of you are traveling. but i plan on being pretty active again, maybe not the thrillseeker i once was but i will be doing some of the same sports again.

and how about people with the pubic bone resorption?

I had it all, at one point a surgeon wanted to remove the pubic joint and fuse my pelvis. But three surgeons (NY England and Atlanta) said NO.

That was the biggest problem. I was losing my pubic bones.

I've come a long way, my left SI joint is still stuck which is causing all this stress in my pubic area. Everything else seems to be moving freely, FINALLY! I just hope that there is no more damage in my lower abdomen.

xrunner, are you in or near nyc?

if so hit me with an email, i can suggest a great doctor for you to see, one that can probably help out immensely.

mystery(dot)zombie(at)hotmail(dot)com

xrunner, you are exactly right, the doctor I saw before my SH surgeon focused only on the canal and not on my abdomen at all. He thought I had a hernia... which I didn't have at all....

I am at 12/ 13 weeks post op (w/ Dr. Meyers). I still get agitation in the area and minor pain (it's different than it was pre-surgery, though), but with anti-inflammatories and consistent training, it gets much better (I notice that it gets tight when I take a couple of days off). I have all of my gymnastics back (including my tumbling passes with extremely high amounts of twisting) that I was doing pre-surgery and additional strength (though not quite 100% yet) that I haven't had since before my injury!

So I just finally recovered from my sports hernia repair on the right side and yesterday I jogged about a mile and played a little soccer but today I feel a great deal amout of pain in my left side groin. What are the chances that I did another sports hernia thing on my left side. Is it likely that you can rehurt a sports hernia easily?

dr muschaweck says that a large percentage of men that get a one-sided sh develop one on the other side. but not all. sorry, thad, but she knows her stuff, and it would be worth your time to get it checked. i think that my left side started to bother me about 2 years before a big blowout when both got totally f^&%ed up in a sports accident.

Hi again, i went to Dr. Myers last summer complaining of possible SH on my opposite side which was repaired 2years earlier. Myers along with head of UCLA sports medicine diagnosed labrum tear. Myers said that when a pelvic floor is permanetly sutured back in place it tightens the area which leads in my case to the opposite side hip bone pointing into the acetabulm socket - creating the labrum tear. I caused mine surfing a year and a half ago. When I sat on my surfboard, in between waves, one has to straddle the board with legs outstretched. I noticed this opposite side pain but learned later about the labrum tear. Myers was very interested in this phenonenom but i declined his philladelphia treatment and came back to CA. I was in line to get a new arthroscopic hip tear procedure where they Remove your femur from the hip socket. trim the tear and shave the bone end that goes into it. All this is very likely due to the new pelvic tightness of the SH repair side. Dr. Guanche will be my Dr. for this procedure next month.

Unfortunately I have been saddled with a knee lesion on my lower femur which was diagnosed as either necrotic or osteochrondritis desicans, depending on who you talk to. This was caused most likely from a bike accident 10 years ago.

So I have a couple procedures coming up. My hernia side still is very tight but the other side has the FAI/ labrum tear that manifests in the lower abdomen a little like the inguinal SH pain site , some 3 years ago.

So my advice get a died hip MRI to help diagnose labrum tears post SH repair.

HAppy healing! Hey maybe this year? 2008 ?

I got a sports hernia repaired on my right side two weeks ago. The lower abdomen feels somewhat better, but I still have significant pain in my inner thigh, especially when I squeeze my legs together, and my hip is tight too. My doctor didn't really tell me what to expect, so how long can i expect to wait before I can exercise again, and is this inner thigh pain related to the sports hernia? Thanks in advance for any responses, I am kind of feeling around in the dark here.

My case is rather sad. I had drs in the 90's who hadn't a clue, but were

experimenting on me.

Once they saw the bone loss most drs were afraid to

even help me. So I went all over the world.

I'm in Chicago and

Northwestern even told me in 96 to 'go to Europe'

Ironically when I was in

Munich (2006) I ran into a Bears surgeon there who wanted to see my sevenh and

eighth operations. Ten years too late I told him.

I have learned that loosening up my back helps a

lot.

My bowels after 13 years are finally moving freely.

But my left butt

muscle is so damn tight. My last frontier, I hope.

I do all kinds of

stretches and I'm slowly improving. Dr Muschaweck did fix what a lot of

surgeons screwed up on me.

I never had pain in my thighs until the head

surgeon at Madison and Nesovic (who invented the sports hernia in the 70s)

operated on me. And yes I had to travel to Belgrade twice. I waited until

we stopped bombing and Milosevic was rounded up and sent to the Hague.

This has been unreal.

Those two drs sewed the nerves into the scar tissue

causing all that extra unnecessary pain. My two surgeries in Munich took

over 3 hours (1:55 and 1:15, a new record I was told.) I am in much less

pain, but I still don't have any of the strength I had when I ran 32

minute 10k's.

I keep working on my back and pelvis. Every single time I

get a pop back there, my groin feels so much better.

I damaged my back

from 11 years of throwing my body around playing ultimate. I played at

three different schools while getting my bs/ms/ph.d. My ultimate

colleagues had warned me years ago that I hadn't a clue on how to dive for

the disk and I guess they were right.

Wow, that does sound like nightmare, I'm glad I haven't had to travel extensively, etc. My doctor seemed pretty good, Dr. Brunt at Barnes in St. Louis. He is supposed to be the best in the area. I am to the point now that i will be happy to be able to even bike. Ideally I want to run again, but if the pain is gone enough that I can bike i will consider the operation a success.

I never worried about traveling, I just wanted my life back.

I went to Nebraska for PT last summer, what a waste of time and money.

and someone once asked, who did Tom Brady's surgery.

I haven't heard of this guy before and after the surgery, but his name is....

Dr L. Douglas Dolgov Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation.

I wonder who just did Joe Sakic's surgery.

Have just found this website by searching for a clue on what my symptons may be. Have suffered for 2-3 years now. Seemed to start after doing the 10 mile Great South Run in England. Now I was fairly fit at the time but not a runner. Only did a few training runs of 3-4 miles each and then the real thing. Shortly after, I began to suffer from this sharp but never really excrutiating pain which moved around the lower groin/pubic bone area (even feels like it is in the penis itself sometimes)and occasionally had a duller pain in the balls. Not at all similar to groin strains that I used to get playing football. After a few months this subsided. Then it has come back regardless of any rest period. I have been back to docs/hospital and gone through blood tests/prostate gland tests to eliminate the 'nasties' as I was worried about prostate/bowel cancer. Latest visit was today where they have now booked me in for an ultrasound but having read this site i am not convinced this will be of any assistance. Am now thinking this was caused by running a long distance with little preparation. Have just started to try and get fit again and shed some weight after Christmas and been back on the treadmill... and it has come back again.

One piece of advice, don't see Dr Hackney in Leeds, he is a hack.

Hello,

I had sports hernia surgery on both sides at the end of November by Dr Muschaweck in Munich. Up until last week I still had pain all over due to bruising of the nerves during the operation.

I woke up on New Years Day and the pain had gone, completely !! I did a few runs to test it out and no pain.

On Sunday night and last night I played football, last night for 60 minutes and have absolutely no pain in my groin. Fingers crossed this will continue, I just wanted to share some positive news as I know from experience that when most doctors cant even diagnose the injury it can seem like it will last for ever.

My advice to you Mike and anyone else who thinks they may have a sports hernia is to stop doing sport completely and see a specialist. I think if you carry on training this will only prolong your recovery period after an operation if one is necessary.

The guy I saw in England was Dr Gilmore in Harley Street but decided to have the operation in Germany due to comments made on this site and the fact that most professional footballers go and see Dr Muscahweck.

I hope this helps, and will update again if I have any relapse.

Good luck everyone

I had bilateral sports hernia repair 4 1/2 weeks ago on December 6. I waited almost 4 weeks before my first run on New Years Day. I had surgery with Dr. Pierce at the Midwest Hernia Clinic in Edina, MN who told me I could begin running again 3 weeks after surgery. Dr. Pierce worked with Dr. Joesting who is now retired. I like Dr. Pierce and he seemed to know his stuff and has worked on several runners over the years. He uses a double layer mesh repair.

Now, 4 1/2 weeks after surgery, my lower abdomen feels great and I no longer get severe pain when I sneeze. I felt no pain in the lower abdomen or groin during my run, just a lot of tightness. I've now run 3 times and done the elliptical a couple of times. I still feel good, and don't have abdomen or groin pain when I run, but the inside of my groin, the adductor area, is still really sore especially after running. It still hurts a lot when I squeeze my knees together. I'm wondering if this is possible a chronic adductor strain/tear that wasn't really related to the sports hernia. Has anyone had any luck with exercises or therapy to reduce or eliminate the adductor groin pain that occurs when squeezing the legs together? Does it just take more time and rest before this pain goes away? I might be doing too much too soon. I'm still less than 5 weeks post surgery. It seems like the surgery worked well, but I'd really like to resolve the adductor pain. Any help greatly appreciated.

Trailrunners, I am in the exact same boat as you. I had the surgery 2 weeks ago. My abdomen feels somewhat better (although not completely yet) but I still have the adductor pain. I have had this pain on and off for two years. My doctors told me they didn't think it was related to the hernia. For me, exercises have made it feel worse and I am wondering if it is a nerve thing. I would also appreciate hearing from anyone with advice.