John Delach

I have changed the names of the doctors in my piece.

On Friday, August 22, Mary Ann and I met with Doctor Neal King. to discuss a possible revision of my right hip. I had been put into contact with this orthopedic surgeon by my regular orthopedist, Dr. Frank Pella had explained: “He’s a bit quirky, but he’s one of the best at performing a hip revision surgery.

For those readers who are not familiar with the expression “Hip revision,” it refers to an operation that removes a defective artificial hip replacement and replace it with a new one. In 2012, I had my original right hip replaced. All went well until ten years later when I began to develop pain in that area. Long story short, turns out that my replacement hip had been recalled because it was shedding cobalt and chromium.

The more investigating that I did, the more I became aware that a revision is considerably more complicated than the original hip surgery and the recovery is longer and harder. Still, I remarked to Mary Ann on the very day we drove to Doctor King’s office, “Mary Ann, I am starting to accept that this operation is inevitable.” 

We arrived for our appointment on Marcus Avenue in Lake Success a bit early and were taken to the X-Ray room before we did anything else. I was fourth in line and, when the technician was finished,  I was told to return to the main waiting room  where we waited and waited. Finally, sometime after noon, we were taken to a waiting room where we waited for Doctor King.

Now, after Doc Pella had said Doc King was a bit quirky, I looked him up. Dr. King’s bio included a photo of a large man in a dark suit with a neatly trimmed beard sporting a large, bright, nicely tied bow tie.

Finally, when the door to the examination room opened, it took me a few moments to adjust to the sight of this slovenly man with whispering hair moving in many different directions. Instead of a suit, he wore old, worn, ripped and ill-fitting hospital scrubs. His beard, like his hair, was grey and straggly. At first, I couldn’t believe that this was the same chap I saw in the photo. It was only when I could see his name stitched onto his shirt that I accepted that this was Dr. King.

He was almost all business. He insisted on finding the degree of cobalt and copper that my hip was shedding. Mary Ann said the cobalt was a seven out of a possible 300 and copper was merely a one. After reading this, Doctor King took the chair on the opposite side of the room across from the two of us and addressed me in no uncertain terms.

“I wouldn’t recommend this surgery even if your score for shedding was as high as 40 or maybe even 80. That would be true even if you were a much younger man, but since you are over eighty, I wouldn’t agree to it unless the score was in triple digits! This operation is f**king difficult and it could leave you crippled and unable to walk. Don’t proceed with this surgery.”

This was a startling statement. No other doctor had ever mentioned that an operation may not  be a workable alternative for me and for a surgeon to proclaim this was something I never thought I would hear.

What a relief, what whole new chance to continue living without subjecting my body to life as a cripple. Thanks be to God and thanks be to Doctor King and honest surgeon. I thanked him for being this honest and candid with me. “Doctor King, I have been terribly concerned about submitting myself to this operation and what it could do to my body. Now I have absolutely no reason to challenge you and as far as I’m concerned, the possibility of going forward is gone now and forever.”

We talked about a follow-up in 2026, but I have no intention of going back to him ever again.

One of the first thing I did was to contact a travel agent and reinstate our reservation for a cruise on Norwegian Cruise Lines to New England and Canada beginning on August 31^st.

The cruise went well and Mary Ann and I had a blast and returned home last Sunday.

I’ll deal with future pain should that become an issue and continue to live my life with absolute thanks for this change of fortune.