PATS’ QB TOM BRADY AMAZES HIS DOCTORS WITH REHAB PROGRESS

Both Tom Brady and the New England Patriots have experienced their ups and downs since the star QB suffered a season ending injury in the opening game of the 2008 NFL season.  The Pats posted a decent 11-5 record with Matt Cassel under center as starting QB, but didn’t qualify for the playoffs.  Brady, meanwhile, suffered through an early setback in his rehab due to infection which necessitated a second surgical procedure.  All of that negativity is in the past, however, a fact confirmed by Brady’s doctor on Monday who spoke of his patient’s progress in rehab in terms that were just short of ‘miraculous’.

This is all great news to the Patriots, who had so much confidence in Brady’s ability to return to his starting role in time for the start of the 2009 NFL season that they traded Cassel to Kansas City.  Brady returned to organized activities with the team early last week, and spoke to the Boston area media on Thursday for the first time since suffering the season ending knee injury.  On Monday, the doctor that performed the surgery expressed his extreme satisfaction with the progress Brady has made.  Dr. Neal ElAttrache, an orthopedic surgeon specializing in sports medicine at the Kerlan-Jobe Orthopedic Clinic as well as the Los Angeles Dodgers’ team doctor, spoke to the Los Angeles Times about Brady’s rehab and future prognosis.  Brady, he noted, had surpassed even his most optimistic expectations:

“Brady even exceeded what I thought he was going to be able to do, and I was expecting big things from him."

The reason for the dramatic and rapid improvement?  Essentially, the fact that athletes are simply ‘wired differently’ than the average person:

"Let's face it, guys that are athletes like him, they're strung together different. By and large, they follow the same biologic rules as the rest of us. However, they're able to do things with their neuromuscular control and their strength gains and how they respond to exercise a little bit differently. Within safe limits of how we know how these things heal after an operation like this, I had to take that into consideration."

Despite working with a number of professional athletes, Brady’s rehab success is unprecedented in his experience:

"With regard to his recovery of strength, I've never seen anything quite like it. With an average person, it would have taken probably twice as long to get range of motion and strength back."

Brady, meanwhile, credited Dr. ElAttrache for both his skill in performing and original surgery and dealing with a few post operative setbacks:

"I remember when we came out of the original procedure and five days later things weren't going the way that we hoped, and I think it was his instincts and quick decision-making that got me in there before anything really bad could happen. If you misdiagnose something like that, then you have big problems. It was his judgment and instincts, and then him assuring me that everything was going to be OK.”

"Obviously, with how I feel now, he was 100 percent right in what he did. It's great for me to have so much trust and to know that hopefully nothing ever comes up again but if it does that I have somebody like him in my corner."

Both Brady and his doctor remain confident of a full recovery, and expect him under center when New England opens the 2009 season at home against the Buffalo Bills on Monday, September 14^th.  While the team is expected to be cautious with Brady during training camp and the preseason, both the QB and his doctor had no reason to think that he wouldn’t be ready to go for the start of the regular season.