CASE STUDY: Cyclist Victoria Valentine
FINDING the right treatment for her partial proximal hamstring tear proved elusive for Victoria Valentine, formerly of Peterborough Cycle Club.
Ranked as seventh in the world of cycling at the time of her injury, Victoria fell when out running in Lincolnshire and went to her local A& E.
While she managed to get surgery within a few months for her two totally torn hamstrings on her left side, obtaining proper treatment to repair the partial tear on the right side was a much longer and more difficult journey.
While hamstring injuries are one of the most common injuries for sports people, proximal hamstring tears and avulsions are a much rarer type and without the correct treatment are potentially seriously debilitating.
Victoria, who now runs a popular Facebook group to help people find the right treatment for proximal injuries, explains: “Immediately I knew that something was very wrong with my hamstrings and it was not an ordinary hamstring strain.
“However, I was told by several medical professionals that I had an ordinary hamstring injury and that I could not possibly have torn my hamstrings from my sit bones.
“Because this injury is relatively rare, many health professionals have never seen it before and do not know how to diagnose or treat the injury.
“I had to self-diagnose my injury and, by showing health professionals how I failed the bowstring test, I eventually convinced my GP that my injury was more serious.
“Five months after my fall I had surgery to repair my left leg. Unfortunately, the still undiagnosed partial tears in my right leg continued to cause significant pain and the year of rehabilitation after the repair of the full tears made no difference to the pain in my right leg.
“Two years down the line, I decided to self refer privately to get the surgery I needed and finding Mr Chris Wilson was like discovering a knight in shining armour.
“I sent my MRI scans to both the USA and Finland to help confirm my own diagnosis, which was a 50% tear on the right side.
“After the two years it took to get the diagnosis, it took just a week to get an appointment with Mr Wilson at Nuffield Health in Cardiff and a week later, in June 2017, I was fitted in and fixed, with just one overnight stay following my surgery at the Vale hospital.
“I am fully functional again and can run and cycle but not at the same level.
“Thankfully I have not had any damage to the sciatic nerve, which is one of the risks of surgery.
“Sadly my injury had a detrimental effect on my fitness and health as I was unable to run after the injury, only walk, so cycling is now no longer a big part of my life.
“I used to do a four-hour training ride but now I’ve had to cut that back to two hours and no longer ride for the club.
“The later the injury is left, the more difficult it is to fix and the delay means the outcome is likely to be less good.
“The first hurdle is getting an accurate diagnosis and the second is finding a surgeon trained in this technique, who will and can repair it.
“I am very keen to spread the word because those with this injury are often unable even to sit comfortably, experiencing ongoing constant pain and so it is very disabling.
“My self help Facebook page is called Proximal Hamstring Injury and Surgery – we have more than 1,500 in our ‘Hamster Club’ hoping for treatment.”