I would like to give this surgeon a negative or zero rating. In March 2019 I tore the rotator cuff in my right shoulder while painting our home (It was not a fall as indicated in Dr. Ackerman's July 24th 2019 surgery report). Unfortunately, I also needed a hip replacement (April 2019) and nothing was done with the right shoulder until I had recovered from the hip replacement.
Prior to the July 24th 2019 surgery I was told by Dr. Ackerman that there was a 90+% chance that a reverse shoulder replacement would need to be done rather than a repair. The surgery report discusses why the repair was the surgery choice but there is no discussion of why the ball (humeral head) needed to be increased in size. I was told AFTER the surgery that it was to "stabilize" the joint.
On August 13th, 2020 Dr. Ackerman performed a left reverse shoulder replacement. At the follow-up appointment (one year) for the left shoulder on August 27, 2021, Dr. Ackerman requested that I raise my right arm over my head to see how I was doing on the right shoulder. He noticed that I had a "twinge" (A grimace might be more appropriate). Throughout the Fall of 2021 the pain in the right shoulder continued to increase. It reached the point where it hurt to lift a small dish into the cupboard. Sleeping and general physical activities became painful/difficult; I could not lift my right arm above shoulder height without excruciating pain.
In January 2022 I consulted the Florida surgeon who had initially examined me following the rotator cuff tear after the painting activity in March/April 2019. I went through an additional 5 weeks of painful physical therapy to determine if it was possible to stretch 65-year-old+ muscles and tendons over a 25% larger joint - it was not. On March 17, 2022 a total reverse replacement surgery was performed. The surgery required 2.5 hours and the joint had to be rebuilt with bone chips, BMP putty and screws. Once the pain block wore off, the pain was intense. When orthopedic surgeons operate on the same joint a second or third time, they generally go in through the same incision. The staples were removed on approximately March 24th. Over the next weekend, the incision began bleeding and I returned to the surgeon's office on March 30, 2022. I had developed a hematoma under the incision and a second surgery was performed on March 31st to put in a drain tube. Cultures taken after the second surgery indicated that I had developed an infection which required 6 weeks of antibiotics through a PIC line administered by my wife. The copay/out of pocket cost of the antibiotics was over $2,200. I will be doing some physical therapy for my shoulders for the remainder of my life.
I attempted to find an attorney but North Dakota has a $500,000 limit on damages in medical malpractice lawsuits so no out-of-state firm would take my case . One of the Bismarck firms would not take my case because they were fearful that a Bone & Joint Center P.C. (Bone & Joint) surgeon might do a lesser quality surgery if they knew the attorney/patient had won a malpractice case against Bone & Joint! I did locate a Board-certified surgeon who would have testified that the procedure performed by Dr. Ackerman was a "deviation from the standard of care". My Florida surgeon would not speculate on why the bigger ball was used but the bottom line is Dr. Ackerman was too lazy to perform a difficult procedure; he took the easy way out. If even one potential patient doesn't have a surgery performed by this surgeon, this post will have done some good. read more
