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The Calanea

  • holes designed to match screwhead profile
  • color coded for size identification
  • numerous holes for versatile screw fixation

This isn't Ikea's description of computer furniture, nor is it about my new computer mod. These are marketing blurbs used in the brochure for the Calcanea. The Calcanea being a plate (such as the one on the picture taken from this website) that can be screwed to the calcaneus (or heelbone for mere mortals) to aid recovery. It also happens to be the kind of thing that makes my skin crawl, and it is going to happen to me next Tuesday.

Going downhill

This story is getting worse and worse. The night I fell down (last Thurday, almost a week ago now) my first thought was I just go to bed and see how it would feel the next day. I know, it's a rather outfated concept (caveman style) these days, but it's really what I thought. It was my friend that suggested we should probably go to the hospital for a check, and I agreed that was a good idea. In the back of my head I still thought I'd be in and out in a second, with a doctor telling me to take a few day's rest.

What actually happened was that they took an X-ray (in a very familiar room) and told me it was broken and that a broken heelbone could keep me busy for three months. That was a big shock. I hadn't expected that at all. But, they couldn't really see very well on the photo and I have to come back the next morning for a CT-scan. So I did.

The next morning, the doctor looked at the scan and told me it was quite serious, and that this type of fracture was something I perhaps needed to be operated on. But, he wasn't quite sure and sent the scan to another hospital for a second opinion. I got the results the next day: I needed the operation.

What's next?

So today I went to the hospital in Amsterdam to discuss the operation. The doctor showed me the scan and explained the fracture (maybe I'll put the scan up here, it looks quite interesting. I'm not sure yet). The bone is fractured in multiple places and compressed from the top (the impact forced the bone above, the talus, down on it). So I need this plate with screws to keep the whole thing together. The future? Well, I cannot use the leg at all for the first 3 months. The next three months I will slowly recover and I should be able to walk without crutches in 6 months time. A long time...