In his 69 years, Tom Nickel has fought more than his share of health battles.

He was diagnosed with kidney disease before turning 30, had both hips replaced and underwent neck fusion surgery to give him more stability in his spine.

In early 2024, Tom embarked on yet another medical journey. His mobility had been declining and the pain in his back was getting worse. One Sunday morning, however, Tom woke up with no feeling whatsoever in his legs.

“It was totally gone,” he says.

Initially, Tom was taken to the community hospital in his hometown of Waupun, Wisconsin, but it became clear that he needed to be treated at a larger hospital with specialists in spine surgery and kidney disease.

As soon as he could be transferred to Madison, Tom went straight to the operating room, where Dr. Miranda Bice, a UW Health orthopedic spine surgeon, would perform a decompression and stabilization operation to relieve pressure on Tom’s spinal cord that was caused by a narrowing of his spinal canal between his shoulder blades.

“When I was taken to the operating room,” Tom says, “I remember Dr. Bice and the nurses telling me they will do the best they can for me. They couldn’t promise anything, including whether I would ever again walk or regain sensation in my legs.”

After a few days of recovery, Tom was transferred to the UW Health Rehabilitation Hospital on Madison’s far east side. Fueled in part by an unstoppable desire to get better, Tom outperformed expectations with his progress. Rehabilitation can be a grind some days, but Tom’s drive to get better left an everlasting impression on his care team.

Incredibly determined to get better

“Tom was incredibly determined from the first time I met him,” says Dr. Jacob Halvorsen, a UW Health rehabilitation medicine physician. “He said he would walk out of the rehab hospital with a walker, and I honestly didn’t believe him.”

David Grieve, a UW Health physical therapist who spent countless hours working with Tom, says that initially, Tom not only lacked coordination but also proprioception, which is the body’s ability to sense where its parts are in space.

“People without coordination and proprioception are typically confined to a wheelchair,” Grieve says. “They simply don’t have enough control of their muscles to walk safely because they can’t get their arms and legs to move where they want them to. When Tom first got here, his legs would move uncontrollably both side to side and back and forth.”

Rehab Hospital patients receive three hours of therapy each weekday. It’s an aggressive regimen that can overwhelm some patients, but Tom jumped into the routine.

“Tom and I spent a lot of time trying to build up his heart rate using a body weight support system that protects him from falling in case his legs give out,” Grieve says.

“After just a few days at the Rehab Hospital,” adds Dr. Halvorsen, “I knew he would have a good stay. He progressed much more than I anticipated.”

His surgeon, Dr. Bice, says it’s still too soon to know how much more progress Tom can make, but what he has achieved so far is remarkable nonetheless. 

“Many people with Tom’s injury go home wheelchair bound,” says Dr. Bice. “Tom had a great rehab team and his attitude certainly helps too. He’s clearly getting some neurological function back that appeared to be permanently lost.”

Aside from his wife Linda, his two grown children and three grandchildren, Tom’s biggest passion is playing golf, which he was doing three times a week until Thanksgiving 2023.

“I told Dr. Bice that I would be back on the golf course by July (2024) and she said you might want to back off on that a bit,” Tom says.

While he is already practicing his swing in the backyard, only time will tell if he’ll be able to play on a course again.

“Mental attitude is such a big part of the ballgame,” Tom says. “You have to want it more than anybody else.”

Meanwhile, cancer strikes Tom’s wife

Tom is not the only fighter in the Nickel household. Around the time he started kidney dialysis, Tom’s wife Linda was diagnosed with cancer. Despite a very uncertain prognosis, she is doing well following an intensive course of chemotherapy.

“Linda went through so much more than I did,” Tom says. I didn’t want to burden her with the stress of caring for me when she was dealing with a life-threatening illness. I either had to be self-sufficient or go somewhere else.”

Tom acknowledges that his stubbornness sometimes works to his own detriment, but the gratitude he expresses for the care he received from UW Health is nothing short of infinite.

“Everyone at the Rehab Hospital was caring, kind and compassionate,” he says. “I didn’t meet one person who was not always trying to do what was best for me. Everybody radiated positivity, and I could not have made this much progress without them.”

About two days before he was scheduled to go home, Tom told one of his nurses that when it came time to leave, he’d be walking to his car with a walker.

“I’m sorry, Tom,” replied the nurse. “We always take patients to their vehicle or medical transportation van in a wheelchair.”

You can probably guess how that story ended. Hint — it did not involve a wheelchair.

This story originally appeared on uwhealth.org.

For more than two decades, Nathan Petesch has put on a staggering amount of mileage — not only on his cars but his body. The Orthopedic Surgery team at UW Health couldn’t do much to reverse the mileage on Nathan’s vehicles, but they did a masterful job restoring his left hip.

Before landing his current position as assistant men’s and women’s track/cross country coach at the University of Wisconsin – La Crosse, Nathan coached runners at a half dozen colleges around the country. Part of coaching duties include plenty of running himself, usually as the “pacer” who leads the pack of student athletes at a certain speed that varies according to the distance of the race for which the team is preparing.

After years of running 70 to 90 miles a week, however, Nathan’s hip started to show its wear and tear not long after he turned 33.

“The pain started in the spring of 2021 and I just kept running through it for a while,” he says. “Unfortunately, my hip just kept getting worse as the year went along. By late fall, I was pretty hampered and missing a few days of training.”

A sports medicine doctor in La Crosse diagnosed Nathan with a tear in his left labrum, which is the cartilage that lines the hip socket. Soon, Nathan found his way to the UW Health Sports Medicine Clinic, where he met with Dr. Andrea Spiker, an orthopedic surgeon who specializes in hip preservation surgery.

“Nathan described increasing hip pain as well as loss of range and motion,” says Dr. Spiker. “He also was hearing snaps and pops as he moved around. When we looked at his imaging, we found that in addition to the labrum tear, Nathan was experiencing hip impingement, which occurs when the ball at the top of the femur, or thigh bone, is not as round as it should be. This prevents the hip joint from moving smoothly and was the trigger for his symptoms. He tried physical therapy and anti-inflammatories, but things did not improve over several months.”

Knowing that a well-functioning hip was essential not only for running but a better quality of life, Nathan realized that surgery would be necessary to achieve his goals.

“It was a little scary facing surgery at 33 thinking that my quality of life could be severely impacted, given what I do for a living,” Nathan says. “When I met with Dr. Spiker, I felt very comfortable and confident that I would be in good hands. Her experience and positive patient reviews only enhanced my comfort level.”

Quite the finish to Nathan’s day of surgery

As the big day approached, surgery was not the only thing on Nathan’s mind.

“Our men’s team had a track and field meet in La Crosse that evening, and I was thinking about one of our athletes who was racing to qualify for the NCAA Championships. I felt bad that my surgery was the same day.”

The operation itself could not have gone more smoothly.

“I performed a hip arthroscopy, which is a minimally invasive outpatient surgery to restore a more normal shape to the bone, repair the torn labrum and restore smooth function to the joint,” says Dr. Spiker. “It not only allows the patient to enjoy a pain-free lifestyle and return to high levels of activity,” she adds, “We also believe that improving the mechanics of the hip will prevent future hip arthritis.”

Nathan was out of surgery late that afternoon. It wasn’t long before his girlfriend pulled the car up to the front of the hospital and the two were heading back to La Crosse.

After a round trip from La Crosse to Madison with a hip surgery thrown in for good measure, most people would call it a day and hop straight into bed. Nathan, however, couldn’t help himself. He showed up at the track that evening to see his runner compete in the 10,000 meters.

“He not only won the race but broke the school’s 42-year-old record and has since won three national titles. There are only so many moments of magic in an athlete’s career and I was grateful to be there for one.”

After finally making it home, Nathan took it easy for a few days. He began weaning himself off crutches after a few weeks. Home exercises assigned by his physical therapist allowed Nathan to start building up his strength and range of motion. 

Within three months after surgery, he started light running. By late fall, he was feeling 100 percent with no pain and no restrictions. For the past year or so, he is back to a weekly pace of 70 to 90 miles, which is at least as far as he was running before the surgery.

“I have nothing but positive things to say about the whole experience,” Nathan says. “We’re lucky to have some of the best medical professionals here in the state. I would certainly recommend the UW Health team to anyone who is dealing with injuries that have hampered their ability to stay active.”

This story originally appeared on uwhealth.org.

Linda Canfield never thought that her first attempt at playing pickleball would end with a 90-mile ambulance ride to UW Health University Hospital in Madison, Wisconsin, followed by an orthopedic trauma surgery the next day.

In August 2022, the St. Paul, Minnesota resident, two college friends, and their husbands ventured to Galena, Illinois for a summer weekend getaway. On that hot Saturday afternoon, Linda, then 64, decided to give pickleball a try. With paddles in hand, Linda, one friend, and her husband began hitting the ball around the court.

“We were almost finished, and I remember running laterally across the court,” Linda recalled. “My legs got awkwardly wrapped around each other, and in an instant, I fell to the ground. I heard a pop and knew right away that I had broken something, and it was probably my hip.”

Unable to move, Linda lay on the court while friends called 911.

“I remember the siren blowing as I was lying there in pain, sweating and swearing to myself,” Linda said. “The court surface was scorching hot. The EMTs were asking lots of questions so they could decide what to do before moving me.”

Eventually, the crew safely moved Linda into the ambulance before taking her to the local hospital. X-rays would show that the break was not a simple one. Linda would need to go to a larger hospital with greater orthopedic expertise. The next closest larger hospital was 15 miles away in Dubuque, Iowa, but it was full.

Husband advocated for UW Health

Linda’s husband, Jim Thornton, who earned his master’s degree at UW–Madison, strongly urged the EMT crew to transport Linda to UW Health in Madison..”

“I just felt in my heart that with all of the good surgeons there and Madison being a leading trauma center, UW would be the best place,” Jim recalled.

As Linda’s ambulance departed for Madison, Jim followed behind in his car; they arrived at University Hospital early that evening. Surgery to repair Linda’s bone break took place the following day.

“I remember the orthopedic surgical team preparing me. They all made me feel I was in very capable hands,” Linda said. “They even asked me what kind of music I liked, so after I told them, they put some Carrie Underwood on.”

A native of Rochester, Minnesota, Linda recalled talking to her mother on the phone from her hospital bed in Madison.

“My 90-year-old mother still lives in Rochester and suggested that I come to the Mayo Clinic,” Linda said. “Of course, I was in no position at this point to come to Rochester. I told my mom that my UW Health surgeon was named Dr. Paul Whiting and she Googled him.

“After she discovered that Dr. Whiting went to Harvard Medical School, she was satisfied that I was in good hands,” Linda said. “Dr. Whiting got a big laugh out of that story.

Fracture was just below the hip 

While casually described as a broken hip, Linda actually broke the uppermost portion of her left femur, the bone that runs straight from the knee to the hip. Surgeons call her break a subtrochanteric femur fracture.

“Linda was fortunate that the hip joint itself was not broken, so she was able to keep her native hip,” said Dr. Whiting.

“We repaired Linda’s fracture by making an incision and inserting a 15-inch titanium rod inside the hollow part of the femur,” said Dr. Whiting. “We secured the rod, which is about one-half inch thick, with screws above and below the fracture. This provides rotational stability and durability while the fracture heals. Because the rod is placed inside the bone, patients generally don’t experience any hardware irritation.”

Although the natural healing process is not complete until three to six months after surgery, patients with Linda’s type of repair can bear full weight on the leg right away because this type of surgical construct provides such excellent stability. After five nights in the hospital, Linda was discharged to go home.

Grateful for so many caring experts

Linda and Jim appreciated everyone involved in her care, including Dr. Whiting, the orthopedic nurses, physical therapists, and other staff.

“I was so impressed with everyone, from Dr. Whiting, who was so personable, to the fellow who cleaned my room to the person who brought my food tray,” Linda said. “A lot of folks complain about this or that when they’re in the hospital, but I think it’s important to thank all of these kind people who do such a great job.”

Knowing that Linda would prefer to receive follow-up care close to home, Dr. Whiting referred her to a St. Paul-based orthopedic trauma surgeon who had done his residency at UW Health.

“By six months after surgery, I was feeling like my old self,” Linda said. “Last year, we traveled to Hawaii, Texas, Olympic National Park in Washington State, and Europe, where I walked up hills and on uneven sidewalks. Some of my companions even had a hard time keeping up with me.”

For Dr. Whiting and his team, people like Linda are exactly why they do what they do.

“With our extensive experience, training, and the latest technology, our goal at UW Health is to help our patients get back to doing the things they enjoy, whether it’s playing pickleball, tennis, running, or walking,” said Dr. Whiting. “When we can achieve that, we’ve hit a home run.

This story originally appeared on uwhealth.org.

Since she was a little girl, Susan Cowles had good reason to suspect that her knees may one day need medical attention. She was grateful for seven pain-free decades, but by her early 70s, a knee replacement became imminent.

Now 74, Susan was born with an extremely rare skeletal abnormality known as Schmid Metaphyseal Chondrodysplasia. It is typically characterized by short stature and a waddling gait.

As a child, Susan and her parents frequently traveled to Madison so she could receive care from UW specialists. While she built a life and career in medical social work in Milwaukee, Susan returned to Madison for care once again as an adult more than six decades later.

Susan as a young girl

Aside from her 4’5” stature and short, bowed legs, little else has gotten in Susan’s way. Once she reached her early 70s, however, Susan began experiencing serious knee arthritis.

“Genu Varum or ‘bowed legs’ is a common deformity with patients who have Schmid Metaphyseal Chondrodysplasia,” says Dr. Brian Nickel, Susan’s UW Health orthopedic surgeon. “Because Susan’s legs were not straight, extra pressure continued to mount, especially on the inside of her right knee,” he adds. “Her resiliency allowed her knees to last until her early 70s before the pain got bad enough on her right side to make her a candidate for a total knee replacement.”

Dr. Nickel, whose training included a fellowship at the #1 ranked Hospital for Special Surgery in New York City, has performed thousands of knee and hip replacements throughout his six years at UW Health. Susan’s case, he says, required far more preparation and planning than a more conventional patient would need.

Dr. Nickel’s most challenging knee surgery

“Every step of Susan’s surgery was different because of her short stature,” Dr. Nickel says. “This was the most challenging surgery I have done on a first-time knee replacement patient. At UW Health, one of the advantages for patients like Susan is that our team has frequent experience with complex cases. Not only do we provide the highest ranked care in the state for orthopedic surgery, but we also know how to deal with the so-called curve balls. This makes it all the more fulfilling to help patients like Susan get back to living a better life.”

Now with her surgery several months behind her, Susan is back to walking a mile every day supplemented with plenty of yoga stretching. She is incredibly pleased with her outcome.

Making Susan’s story even more compelling is the amount of time since she first traveled to Madison for care. Some 65 years ago, Susan’s parents were having a hard time getting answers about their daughter’s short stature.

“I was misdiagnosed twice as a child, leaving my parents stumped and discouraged,” Susan says. “Finally when I was about 9, our family doctor arranged for me to see a pediatric specialist at UW-Madison named David W. Smith.”

Dr. David Smith joined the UW faculty not long after the creation of the Department of Pediatrics in 1957. Although he would leave Madison within a decade, Dr. Smith would come to be known as a pioneer in the field of dysmorphology — the study of birth defects including growth abnormalities such as Susan’s.

Falling in love with Madison from an early age

“I just loved coming to Madison with my parents,” Susan says. “We would always make a day of it and spend time exploring the university campus. I remember thinking how much I wanted to go to college there, but coming from a strong Catholic family, my parents preferred that I go to a Catholic university in Milwaukee. I never lost my love for Madison, however.”

While being seen by Dr. Smith and a young doctor-in-training named Arlan Rosenbloom, Susan joined a trailblazing medical study that would lead to the establishment of Schmid Metaphyseal Chondrodysplasia as a unique form of inherited dwarfism. Because the field of genetics was in its infancy in the 1960s, Dr. Smith’s study, published in the Journal of Pediatrics in 1965, would later emerge as a seminal piece of clinical research.

“Dr. Smith and I drove across Wisconsin meeting with about two dozen children like Susan and their families,” recalls, Dr. Rosenbloom, the 89-year-old nationally distinguished expert in growth abnormalities. “We learned that the cells at the end of the shorter bones in these kids were disorganized, which disrupted the normal growth process.”

Fast forward to 2022, when the pain in Susan’s right knee was making life difficult.

“An orthopedic surgeon in Milwaukee asked me to have DNA testing to confirm that I truly had the Schmid form of metaphyseal dysplasia,” Susan says. “I started by calling a local genetics department but nobody called me back for two weeks. So I Googled the Genetics Department at UW. A genetics counselor named Peggy Modaff answered her phone directly and listened to my story.”

UW genetics counselor connected Susan with Dr. Nickel

Not only did Peggy send Susan the DNA test kit right away — the test confirmed Susan’s original Schmid diagnosis — but later Peggy provided Susan with recommendations for UW Health orthopedic surgeons.

“Peggy sent me the names of two UW orthopedic surgeons and one of those was Dr. Brian Nickel,” Susan says. “That’s how I first connected with him, so thanks to Peggy and her fast response, I was on my way.”

Peggy’s immediate willingness to listen to Susan’s phone call and then act swiftly left Susan extremely impressed.

“So many people say they’ll get back to you and never do,” Susan says. “Peggy was absolutely fabulous.”

Loving life and feeling free from debilitating knee pain, Susan is amazed at her good fortune, especially with two UW Health encounters spanning more than six decades.

“Everything good to me happens at UW,” she says.

This story originally appeared on uwhealth.org.

Madison native and two-time U.S. Open golf champion Andy North had plenty of options when he finally decided that he couldn’t put off hip replacement surgery any longer.

“I’ve had about 15 surgeries over the past 50 years, mostly sports-related, for my neck, my back, my knees and elbow,” North says.

Over the past few years, however, there was still a part of North’s body that was crying out for help — his left hip.

“By early 2022, I knew I needed to get it taken care of,” says North, 72. “It had been getting worse for the past 5 years and I couldn’t swing a golf club the way I wanted to,” North says. “I couldn’t exercise normally. There were some days it bothered me tremendously, but I was stubborn and just put up with it longer than I should have.”

Although North travelled to places such as Vail, Colorado and Reno, Nevada for some of his surgeries, it didn’t take him long to discover that the best place to have a hip replacement done was in his own backyard — at UW Health. He sat down with Dr. Brian Nickel, a leading joint replacement orthopedic surgeon, in May 2022.

“After I met with Dr. Nickel,” North says, “I felt very comfortable moving ahead. His reputation and track record are very solid and he does hip and knee replacements all the time. You don’t want a guy who does one or two of these a month.”

North also appreciated the convenience of having everything done at UW Health East Madison Hospital, just 30 minutes from his Madison home.

“I didn’t want to get on a plane to get this done, and clearly there was no reason to with the reputation of UW Health’s orthopedic program.”

Nickel, who performs between 700 and 800 joint replacement surgeries a year, checked all the boxes for North, as did the entire Orthopedics team, which is ranked as the best in Wisconsin and “high performing” nationally by U.S. News & World Report.

After talking with Nickel, North knew it was time to move forward. With a busy schedule due to his ESPN golf broadcasting travels, North scheduled the operation for mid-July when his calendar lightened up.

Home the same day

“Andy did great,” Nickel said. “He came in early in the morning and things went very well. He was up and walking about two hours after we finished up the surgery and by early afternoon, Andy was already home.”

Having been through so many operations, North knew what to expect in terms of recovery.

“It’s important to start doing the rehab work before surgery,” North says. “That really helps get the body ready for rehabbing once you get home. I used a walker for about a week. I was eager to get on with my life so I started by walking the halls of my building as much as five times a day. I’m also not a big pain med guy so I was able to manage with Tylenol.”

After a month or so, he was walking throughout his neighborhood and feeling more like himself. On the same day of his 4-week checkup, he hit about 30 golf balls to test his swing. About 10 days later, he met a friend for a little “chip and putt” session, or so he thought.

“I tried a couple long shots and ended up playing 27 holes that day, walking 20,000 steps along the way,” North says. “I was totally worn out and was sore everywhere…well, everywhere except my hip, which felt great.”

As more time passed, North continued to feel better than he had in years. He was doing anything he wanted three months after surgery.

For those who may be putting off hip replacement because they think their active days are over, Nickel has plenty of encouragement.

“You don’t have to be a pro golfer like Andy to have similar results,” Nickel says. “Whether you’re a golfer, pickleball player, gardener or whatever your favorite activity, the majority of people can resume the active life they used to enjoy just two or three months after surgery.”

This story originally appeared on uwhealth.org.