Knee Replacement

Syd Thrift, a former general manager of the Pittsburgh Pirates who spent nearly a half century in baseball, died at 77. He underwent knee replacement surgery Monday in Milford, Del., and died that night, said the Baltimore Orioles, one of many teams for whom he worked. An autopsy will determine the cause of death. "He was a great baseball man - both on and off the field - who dedicated his life to the game," commissioner Bud Selig said. "He was a personal friend of mine and I will miss him. " Thrift became GM of the Pirates in 1985 and gave Jim Leyland his start as a major league manager.

Defenseman Derian Hatcher underwent full right-knee replacement surgery June 1, the Flyers announced yesterday, and it likely signals the end of his career. William Hozack of Rothman Institute performed the surgery at Jefferson Hospital in Philadelphia, the team said, and Hatcher said yesterday that he felt "really good. " "It is a full knee replacement," Hatcher said. "I think they just go in there and saw some of the bone away and put the new knee in. I kind of know the process, but it is hard to explain.

The operation that entertainer Pearl Bailey is set to undergo today at Pennsylvania Hospital to replace her arthritic left knee is a reflection of both modern medicine and technology. From the plastic and metal inserted under the kneecap to the airflow in the operating room to the rehabilitation devices, this procedure owes its success to the marriage of engineering and surgical techniques. "The biggest problem was working out the engineering principles of doing a knee replacement," said Dr. William J. Hozack, the Pennsylvania Hospital orthopedic surgeon who works with Bailey's surgeon, Dr. Richard Rothman.

Two nurses became light-headed and sick to their stomachs this week while assisting in a routine operation at the Virtua-West Jersey Hospital Marlton. One was treated and released. The other has remained hospitalized since the incident Monday morning. "We are very concerned," said Walter Ettinger, the health system's executive vice president for physician services. "We closed the operating room and hired two environmental consultants to look into it. " He said five professionals - a doctor, an anesthesiologist, an intern and the two nurses - were in one of the hospital's seven operating rooms about 9:30 a.m. Monday.

The emerging market for generic medical devices is the backdrop for a legal fight between Synthes Inc., and several former employees who created a company to sell similar products for less money. Headquartered in Switzerland but with facilities in Chester County, Synthes is a global leader in selling plates, rods, screws, and power tools to fix broken bones, which is why Johnson & Johnson has agreed to pay $21.3 billion for Synthes. Yearly global medical-device sales amount to about $300 billion and, with aging populations in developed nations, the market isn't going away.

Wisconsin coach Barry Alvarez will undergo knee-replacement surgery next month because of severe pain that has made him barely able to sleep the past couple of weeks. Alvarez, seated in a wheelchair, said Tuesday that the surgery is planned for Oct. 5 at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn. That's three days after the 20th-ranked Badgers play at No. 12 Ohio State. "I've never been sick a day in my life. I'd never had a stitch until I came here," said Alvarez, the coach at Wisconsin since 1990.

An operation used more than 200,000 times each year to ease the pain of arthritic knees worked no better than a fake surgery, Texas researchers have concluded. Interestingly, though, the placebo surgery wasn't bad. Thirty-five to 40 percent of patients who had undergone either real arthroscopic surgery or a fake operation designed to mimic the real procedure thought they were better, according to a study published in today's New England Journal of Medicine. On average, patients in each group reported a 20 percent improvement in pain and functioning of the knee.

Steve Javie, the pride of La Salle High and Temple, is going to the NBA referees' training camp tomorrow hoping against hope that he can work a 25th season. He can't be certain whether he will be able to work, in his words, "one game or 51," or whether he'll be able to work at all. But his goal when he entered the league in 1986 was to make it through 25 seasons, and something inside him tells him he at least must try. He was close to retiring, because he has no cartilage in his right knee.

Picture this: You're watching a rerun of Gilligan's Island, and waving from the bow of a ship threatening to rescue the castaways is none other than one of those little walking, talking M&Ms of TV commercial fame. Such may soon be reality. Princeton Video's new "virtual product placement" technology enables the digital insertion of product images into existing television series episodes. Reruns of Law and Order soon to be shown on TNT, for example, are a possible target for virtual additions - say, a soda machine sporting the Pepsi logo in a police station, or a shot of Colgate toothpaste in an officer's medicine cabinet.

The Red Sox traded All-Star third baseman Shea Hillenbrand to Arizona for Byung-Hyun Kim yesterday, cashing in their most tradable player for a former reliever who will join their rotation. Kim is best known for his Yankee Stadium meltdown in Games 4 and 5 of the 2001 World Series, but has had a solid career with Arizona. He reluctantly filled the closer's role after Matt Mantei injured an elbow in 2001 and holds the club record with 70 saves, including a team-record 36 last season.

The emerging market for generic medical devices is the backdrop for a legal fight between Synthes Inc., and several former employees who created a company to sell similar products for less money. Headquartered in Switzerland but with facilities in Chester County, Synthes is a global leader in selling plates, rods, screws, and power tools to fix broken bones, which is why Johnson & Johnson has agreed to pay $21.3 billion for Synthes. Yearly global medical-device sales amount to about $300 billion and, with aging populations in developed nations, the market isn't going away.

Steve Javie, the pride of La Salle High and Temple, is going to the NBA referees' training camp tomorrow hoping against hope that he can work a 25th season. He can't be certain whether he will be able to work, in his words, "one game or 51," or whether he'll be able to work at all. But his goal when he entered the league in 1986 was to make it through 25 seasons, and something inside him tells him he at least must try. He was close to retiring, because he has no cartilage in his right knee.

Defenseman Derian Hatcher underwent full right-knee replacement surgery June 1, the Flyers announced yesterday, and it likely signals the end of his career. William Hozack of Rothman Institute performed the surgery at Jefferson Hospital in Philadelphia, the team said, and Hatcher said yesterday that he felt "really good. " "It is a full knee replacement," Hatcher said. "I think they just go in there and saw some of the bone away and put the new knee in. I kind of know the process, but it is hard to explain.

In 1999, after seven games of confinement in the coaches' box and successful knee-replacement surgery, Barry Alvarez had two choices. The then-Wisconsin coach could rest his rehabilitating right knee in the booth where he had watched his team win seven straight games, a Big Ten title and a Rose Bowl berth. Or he could return to his customary spot on the sidelines for the season finale in Pasadena - this time with a cane and a severe limp. Alvarez chose the cane. The Badgers won, but it tells you something about a coach's desire to be with his ground forces even if he has to look like a crippled person in doing so. Joe Paterno, with injured and aging legs, has faced the same dilemma and is currently caught in a sideline-or-box predicament.

The Department of Agriculture threw its weight at dairy farmer Mark Nolt. They seized his inventory. Twice. They dispatched undercover investigators - including a microbiologist - to a farmers' market on multiple occasions. They assigned their chief counsel to prosecute him. Nolt's crime? Selling raw milk without a permit. Yesterday the defendant, a Mennonite farmer from Newville, north of Harrisburg, was found guilty by a district judge in a tiny courtroom and ordered to pay a fine.

WHILE THE war between the NFL and many of its retired players over the disability issue wages on, there is some fairly significant help on the way for uninsured ex-players. The league and the players union are working out the final details of a plan that would fund joint-replacement surgery for retired players who don't have medical insurance. "It's in the very, very near future," NFLPA president Troy Vincent said. "We met 3 weeks ago and we've identified 14 different hospitals [where the surgeries would be performed]

Syd Thrift, a former general manager of the Pittsburgh Pirates who spent nearly a half century in baseball, died at 77. He underwent knee replacement surgery Monday in Milford, Del., and died that night, said the Baltimore Orioles, one of many teams for whom he worked. An autopsy will determine the cause of death. "He was a great baseball man - both on and off the field - who dedicated his life to the game," commissioner Bud Selig said. "He was a personal friend of mine and I will miss him. " Thrift became GM of the Pirates in 1985 and gave Jim Leyland his start as a major league manager.

Karyn Pickard won't compromise her standards, which is why she won't be walking the sideline this winter as the Kingsway girls' basketball coach. At this point, Pickard would settle for just being able to walk anywhere without considerable pain. Pickard, a 1978 graduate of Highland, recently underwent replacement surgery on her right knee. She had already had eight surgeries on the knee, including four knee reconstructions. Still, Pickard had managed to coach a variety of sports at Kingsway.

At 72, Don Zimmer has never drawn a paycheck outside baseball, not even in the winter. He has lost time to injury. He has been fired. Eight years ago, when he was 64, he walked away from the game in Colorado, saying he was finished. But it didn't take. By the next spring, he was back in uniform, this time with the New York Yankees. Since 1949, amazing as it seems, he's never missed a whole season. Someone has always wanted him in one role or other. He's been a major-league coach or manager since 1971.

The Red Sox traded All-Star third baseman Shea Hillenbrand to Arizona for Byung-Hyun Kim yesterday, cashing in their most tradable player for a former reliever who will join their rotation. Kim is best known for his Yankee Stadium meltdown in Games 4 and 5 of the 2001 World Series, but has had a solid career with Arizona. He reluctantly filled the closer's role after Matt Mantei injured an elbow in 2001 and holds the club record with 70 saves, including a team-record 36 last season.