After a few days back in the ring after a hiatus of more than two and a half years, in which he warned that more than a mere return was the beginning of farewell, Juan Martin del Potro is already in Switzerland to undergo a new medical treatment for his right knee Causing him a severe headache since October 2018, in Shanghai, he fractured his patella and underwent four surgeries (with specialists from Barcelona, ​​Miami, Bern and Chicago). The chosen location this time is rinpan clinic, In Muttenz, a Swiss municipality in the Basel Country canton.

Founded in 1981 as “Switzerland’s first sports clinic”, Rennbahnklinik is “a leader in comprehensive care for active people. The clinic’s core competencies include orthopedics, sports medicine, physiotherapy and functional diagnostics”, the medical center is featured on its official website.

Elite tennis players passed there, such as Serbian Novak Djokovic, Greece’s Stefanos Tsitsipas, Italy’s Fabio Fognini and Spain’s Pablo Andujar. Indeed, at the recent tournament in Buenos Aires, del Potro left open the possibility of reappearing on the Tour in the future and emulating, in a certain way, what Scot Andy Murray achieved (two hip operations and competing with another metal implant) and Andújar, who They underwent several elbow surgeries and were able to continue playing after undergoing surgery at Rennbahnklinik.

The clinic in Switzerland where del Potro will undergo a new treatment

After nearly six months with a right elbow injury in 2017, Djokovic, currently ranked number one in the world, underwent surgery at the Rinban clinic. That was in February 2018 and he was able to compete again without issues. The treatment (or treatment) of Roger Federer, the Swiss Olympians and the Basel football team are also treated at the same medical centre.

“There are cases of players in tennis who close the shutter and then miraculously come back for one reason or another. I will always leave that window open. If it was the last night, I was happy. But who wouldn’t want to feel that again? Tennis is now on the sidelines until I try to improve my legs.” said del Potro on Tuesday night, February 8, after falling to Federico Delbonis in the first round of the Argentine Open.

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Thinking that the match at the Buenos Aires Tennis Club was the last official of his career could be wrong: the 33-year-old from Tandil, now without pressure because he managed to stand on a court again, will try to play. and continuity in the coming months. Time will see.

Very rare injury

The injury is quite unusual in tennis. At the time, according to the doctors and kinesiologists consulted by LA NACION, The damage is more frequent in the elderly With osteoporosis who stumble and fall to their knees or in young people who have strong impacts in accidents. And looking at sports, it’s the most common injury in football, of course.

The man from Tandil underwent his first surgery on his right knee in June 2019, in Barcelona, ​​on the recommendation of Angel Ruiz-Coutoro, the trusted doctor for Spanish tennis players. In 2021, at the end of January, he returned to the operating room: in Miami, Dr. Lee Kaplan performed an endoscopic toilet, a kind of “cleanup” of what was wrong with the area. Without the results he expected, the Argentine tennis player in August 2020 underwent surgery for the third time on his knee. Now it was in Bern, Switzerland, by Dr. Roland Biedert, a very trusted professional from Roger Federer. But he is still in pain, in March 2021, after going 21 months without a competition, he returned to the operating room to try to find solutions to his knee problems. This time in Chicago, in front of the Argentine doctor Jorge Shahla. He wrote in his networks: “The Final”.

In the midst of searching for alternatives, del Potro traveled to Porto Alegre, to a medical center that prides itself on performing “non-surgical orthodontic procedures with a revolutionary proposal” and in it, for example, former Uruguay soccer leader Diego Lugano. Del Potro underwent a procedure called BMAC, Stem Cell Center and Bone Marrow Growth Factors. And this is not the first time that during this painful period he has undergone stem cell therapy: it was done by Ruiz Coutoro, a doctor from the Royal Spanish Tennis Federation, but the Argentine did not find the results he expected. It is a relatively recent treatment, which still lacks comprehensive statistics for other treatments and whose efficacy often depends on the “tissue correction” in which it is applied.

– Total idle time if the most severe injuries are added to it: 1984 days. This means that out of his 16 years of professionalism, he hasn’t been able to play in almost five and a half years. Lots of torture. However, one last card is being played in Switzerland.