Dwight's Back, General Info (Great Recap of Interview w/Dr. Klapper on ESPN 710)

[T3R]

Thanks for the thread, very informative.

[LakerBeastmode]

Really happy to see more news on Big Bad DH12 health news! Thanks guys

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[dfchang813]

And trust me when I say we don't want Dwight getting ANYWHERE near that ...

[cital]

I don't understand why the clapper says Dwight should be ready for training camp, and a lot of other reports say he probably won't be back until December at the earliest??? It will be interesting to see what happens

[dfchang813]

[JamaalWilkes]

KLAP ON



KLAP OFF



DR. KLAPPER

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Jim Buss was a guest on the Mason and Ireland show today. They asked Jim about Dwight's back surgery. Jim said before the trade they consulted their Doctors and they were told he will be fine and they are going to rely on their Doctors.
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Nobody in the NBA can touch the Laker brand, which, like the uniform color, is pure gold.

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[dfchang813]

No, never.

There is nothing in medical science that can replace the body's natural elastic cartilage. You want to preserve the MAXIMUM amount possible in any circumstance.

Thus a very small microdiscectomy is light years more preferable than a total disc replacement.

In any case, Dwight isn't even a candidate for that, he has most of his healthy disc intact and doing its job.

A full disc replacement if for a problem several orders of magnitude worse than Dwight's and not even in the same conversation really.

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[lotc]

Dr. Klapper just said he expected Dwight to be ready at the beginning of the season at full strength It was on 710am mason and ireland at 4:30pm

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[dood23]

Looks like Dwight's been pretty busy in terms of physical activity.

http://www.beyondthebuzzer.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/08/106.png
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"There's only 2 dudes better than me, and I'm BOTH OF THEM."

[dfchang813]

A few more highlights from the latest Dr. Klapper interview on Mason and Ireland today:

1. He reiterated that Dwight should be back in prime form by season opener. He has never budged from that because it is pretty straightforward. 4 months shut down from date of surgery and then start working out again to get conditioning and strength back.

They didn't know his date of surgery but I do: 04/20/2012. That would put 4 months at exactly 08/20/2012 and we know he has been working out a few days earlier even than that.

You need 4 months so that scar tissue can build up and fully mature around the hole you drilled to take out the herniated disc and plug it up thus preventing another herniation.

Also we now know that Dwight's herniation is at the level of L4-L5 which is the most common area for disc herniation.

2. Contrary to popular belief, Dwight likely DID NOT suffer the injury from any acute blow on the basketball court from a hit by another player or falling etc. Likely it was caused simply by the wear and tear of playing such an extraordinary amount of minutes without taking any games off over a 7 year period. Once fixed, Dr. Klapper feels there should be no long-term problems.

3. Dr. Klapper did add that Dwight should obviously pay more attention to core strengthening exercises to take more pressure off his back.

4. He mentioned that ANY surgery takes a year for you to fully feel normal again (as a surgeon I can attest to this) but in my OWN PROFESSIONAL opinion, this is voodoo to deflect any patient complaints over small, trivial deviations from normal. After a year, the patient will likely either get used to the new sensation or forget about it.

He feels that while Dwight may feel slightly odd, this should in no way impact his athleticism or basketball play on the court. In other words, unlike Bynum, Dwight is not going to be "playing scared" (Dr. Klapper's words) because he's thinking of another injury to his back for instance.

So final summary, Dwight injury is caused by wear and tear of thousands of NBA minutes over 7 years, it's a very small injury, and he is on schedule to start the season at basically full strength (or however close to full strength 2 full months of running, weights, and basketball activity can get you. The rest he'll pick up over the first month or so of the season)

Hope that helps and if we hear NOTHING more out of the Lakers camp, that will be good news.

Right now, things should be pretty boring because he is simply "catching up" on the 4 full months where he basically sat around doing nothing waiting for his back to scar up so he wouldn't reherniate the disc.

We'll get another update when training camp opens and see where he is at. He won't be quite at full strength obviously but depending on how cautious the Lakers are, they may have him take part in basketball drills and practice anyway.

Again, if everything goes according to plan, there should be NO REASON for him not to participate. The injury and the surgery is past him, he's basically working on regaining his form now and that will take time after a 4 month lay off.

[mirak]

I have to say, I'm really not that worried about Dwight's back. As much as I liked and supported Bynum, I'm less concerned with Dwight's back than I am with Drew's knees. And I suspect that DH, physical freak of nature that he is, will heal much quicker than Drew.

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dfchang813, Thanks again for taking the time to share with us your professional opinion on Dwight's back surgery and rehab. Do you think Dwight might be able to play in some pre season games? First pre season game begins on Oct 7th and the last one is on Oct 25th.
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Nobody in the NBA can touch the Laker brand, which, like the uniform color, is pure gold.

[kobe_luver]

dfchang813....I'm going to copy your last informative post to add to my D12 thread like before. Thanks!

[dfchang813]

Hi Guys,

Appreciate the positive feedback but a few things:

It's important to make the distinction that most of what I have been posting are Dr. Klapper's medical opinions. He is the expert here, not I. I am a head and neck surgeon, NOT an orthopedic surgeon. I do have a comfort level obviously with the vocabulary, the concepts, the anatomy, etc and am translating and extrapolating what I know and what I have read and heard but again I am no expert in these matters.

That said, whether Dwight plays in any pre-season games would be complete and utter speculation on my part. At this point, I have a hard time believing even Dwight's surgeon knows exactly how he will respond. Remember he will have been working out for less than 2 weeks at this point.

A lot will depend on how he feels, how strong he feels, and how much of his conditioning he has gotten back.

Training camp opens October 2nd and the first preseason game is only 5 days later, that is pretty quick. He will have about a month under his belt, not sure if that is going to be enough to throw him into live competition even at the preseason level.

If you want my educated guess, I think he works out and practices with the team but likely won't see any action until the last two preseason games maybe on the 24th and/or the 25th. I doubt he plays both but one of them they will have him in there if no setbacks. Then, he'll start for the season opener.

There's still a chance by the way that if he's not quite back to his full conditioning that the Lakers will play it safe and just hold him out the first few weeks of the regular season. We have a creampuff first month with 11 home games. We'll be fine without him.

But at the end of the day, if Dwight feels strong enough and in shape enough to play, I think he'll want to be out there because the more he plays the more cohesive he'll be with the starting unit and you got to think after over half a year away from the court, he's really going to miss playing pure and simple.

[ThreePointBomber]

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@MatthewJPizzo