Orthopaedic surgeon Dr William O'Callaghan also a media expert in 9 News story on the ‘King’s Knee’

It’s not every day that your expert orthopaedic opinion is sought out by the media, in the context of knee replacement surgery for ‘The King’!!

But that’s exactly the situation that St Vincent’s Private Hospital Northside orthopaedic surgeon Dr William O’Callaghan found himself in the past week!

Brisbane born and raised Dr O’Callaghan is an Australian trained orthopaedic surgeon with Brisbane Orthopaedic Specialist Services (based at St Vincent’s Private Hospital Northside) who specialises in surgery of the knee, hip, shoulder and trauma.

To be clear …. it wasn’t King Charles whose knee was the subject in question – but, Queensland’s own home-grown king – the man sports fan call The King, aka the ‘Emperor of Lang Park’ - State of Origin rugby league legend Wally Lewis!

The fact that ‘King Wally’, aged 64, for decades a sports presenter/reporter, was preparing to have knee replacement surgery was the focus of a news story by his employer Channel Nine News Queensland.

In recent years, Wally has used his profile and media platform as a vehicle to raise public awareness about health issues, most notably his personal battles with epilepsy and a neurodegenerative condition.

Nine News Queensland longtime colleague, 6pm News Presenter, Andrew Lofthouse hosted the story about Wally’s upcoming knee replacement surgery which aired last night. And while Dr O’Callaghan isn’t doing the surgery himself on Wally, Nine News Senior Producer Emily Prain reached out to St Vincent’s in the quest for a “media-friendly” orthopaedic surgeon and knee expert to speak generally about the issue of knee replacement surgery for members of the public.

The news team visited St Vincent’s Northside (on September 23) and interviewed Will after he had finished a morning surgery. They spent almost half an hour (on camera and off camera) gleaning his general advice for viewers who might want to know when the best time is for people to consider knee replacement surgery.

While he wasn’t asked to speak specifically about Wally’s surgery, Dr O'Callaghan told Andrew Lofthouse that having a knee replacement is “a big decision for anyone” and one which people should consider if the pain from their knees is intruding on their quality of life and if they’re not able to do the things they want to do, such as exercising with friends and family.

“If they have difficulty sleeping because the knee is very painful and it’s creating problems with daily activities such as doing the shopping, driving and getting up and down stairs, then it’s time to consider surgery,” says Dr O'Callaghan.

“Although I generally encourage patients to first engage with their GP, physiotherapist and other health care providers and maximise the range of non-operative measures that aren’t as risky as surgery which can potentially improve their quality of life.

“Once you’re at a stage when you’ve gone through that list of non-operative measures over a period of time - and if your quality of life is still declining and your knee’s still painful, intrusive and your function is dropping – that is the time to think about total knee replacement and to talk to an orthopaedic surgeon. The operation is about restoring quality of life to patients – easing the pain from irritable and debilitating arthritis. It’s a very common operation and it’s a very successful operation.”

Dr O'Callaghan said that once someone has decided to undergo a knee replacement (or partial knee replacement) they ideally needed to ‘get into shape’ for the surgery.

“It’s a bit like athletes and the Olympics - you don’t just wake up one day and go to the Olympics. What you want to do is get yourself ready for the big event, the surgery,” says Dr O'Callaghan.

“That means cutting out the cigarettes (if you’re a smoker), drinking less and improving your diet, getting your general health as good as it possibly can be – getting your fitness up, losing some weight if you need to, working with health care providers like your physio to build the muscles around your knee so that you can get through the surgery.”

Like many of St Vincent’s Northside orthopaedic surgeons, Dr O'Callaghan does joint replacement procedures with the Stryker Mako robotics system. St Vincent’s recently hit a major milestone completing its 3000^th robotic joint replacement – one of the leading hospitals in Australia for the innovative use of the technology that is changing and improving the lives of its patients requiring this orthopaedic surgery.

A team of experienced arthroplasty surgeons at St Vincent’s Private Hospital Northside have led the development of total hip, total knee, and partial knee replacement surgery since Mako technology was introduced to the hospital over nine years ago.

Dr O'Callaghan says the Mako system is a suite of technologies which helps surgeons plan before the start of surgery, allowing them to map out with great precision where they will place the implant into the patient.

“When it comes to preparing the joint for the implant, it allows us to get very reliable and reproduceable and safe cuts and that ideally improves the consistency of where we’re able to put the knee implant," he says.

"If we have improved consistency with that, we will have improved consistency in patient outcomes.

It’s an assistive technology to help myself and other surgeons to put in knee replacements as well as we possibly can which should lead to better surgical outcomes resulting in less post-operative pain and a quicker path to rehabilitation.”

To watch the Nine News story, visit the St Vincent’s Northside Facebook page.

Orthopaedic surgeon Dr William O'Callaghan also a media expert in 9 News story on the ‘King’s Knee’

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