Removing hardware?

[Rocko]

My DS broke his leg wrestling last year and has a steel plate in his leg. He has passed DODMERB and is medically qualified. He has no issues with the plate but his Orthopedic mentioned that he could take it out and recovery would only be 2 weeks. He made it sound like it was a very simple process and nothing to worry about.

Has anyone had experience with this and would this possibly medically disqualify my DS this year? Would we need to contact DODMERB for clarification or is this something that needs to go the the Academy/ROTC contacts?

If it is not an issue we prefer to have it removed. I know some people end up having issues later down the road when it is left in and if we can avoid that we prefer to.

 

[JMS]

He has no issues with the plate but his Orthopedic mentioned that he could take it out and recovery would only be 2 weeks. He made it sound like it was a very simple process and nothing to worry about.

I do not have an answer to your direct question, but having seen some very routine surgeries result in serious medical trouble, I would advise asking the Dr. lots of questions about what might go wrong. You may also wish to inquire of other Drs.
Procedurally, I want you to contact DODMERB to get an official answer, but I think it is likely to be: if you choose to have the surgery, it will be a automatic DQ until such time as they get a letter from your Dr. stating 'fully recovered, no limitations or bad stuff"' (Bad stuff is official DODMERB medical terminology;-) ) Then DS sill likely get a few pointed questions about the recovery from the academy medical when he arrives or shortly thereafter.

 

[Rocko]

I appreciate the response. I think we are going to just leave it alone since he has no issues. He can always take it out later in life should he want/need.

There is no sense in taking any unnecassry risk at this point in the process!

 

[GoArmyBeatNavy]

If DoDMERB qualified him with the hardware, they are accepting the risk. Good chance the orthos at USMA would love to take it out. They are very experienced.