By Eurohoops Team/ info@eurohoops.net
Former EuroLeague center Patric Young opened up about the ordeal he went through for years following an ACL tear he suffered on his left knee back in 2015. The American big man said that after a surgery he had in Milan, his knee got infected and the treatment of a doctor in the USA saved his life.
Here’s what Young said in an interview to COSMOTE TV’s “Pick n’ Roll” show:
“When I went to Milano, they wanted to sign me but it was like ‘we’ll sign you only if you allow us to fix the problem on the knee and we can go from there’. Which seemed like a great opportunity: For one, to be locked with a EuroLeague team, to get the operation I needed so I could be ready about the start of next season.”
“It was crazy. I can look back at that time and I can remember everything so vividly. That, I had surgery that night – or was it… in the afternoon – after finally coming into agreement with the team. The surgeon was very well known in Italy, he did a fantastic job with surgery so that wasn’t an issue. It was definitely the physiotherapist and the doctor of the team that was affiliated with Armani, taking me to the pool to start physiotherapy the very next day. I don’t have a healthcare background. I’ve heard about infections but if you’re not taught about it, you don’t understand because doctors even tell you like after certain surgeries to not even shower, to not get those things wet at all because that can lead to an infection as well.
I guess the doctor at the time couldn’t even comprehend that it was an infection that I was dealing with because I was just in a tremendous amount of pain. Because I was in such a bad condition, a fever of 140 degrees, intense pain in my knee, with pus coming out of my knee….
Fortunately, this doctor was able not just to save my career and my leg but actually save my life as well. [The doctor] back in the U.S.