Rehab Process for BYU football player

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To hear a portion of Aaron Sorenson’s interview with Jeff Hurst, scroll to the bottom of the story.

Often, a sports injury can take just a split second to damage a player’s body. But the rehabilitation process to get that body back to full strength can take months — even years.

Sophomore tight end Austin Holt is a perfect example of how an in-game injury can have a lasting impression. Holt tore his anterior cruciate ligament, or ACL, one of the four major ligaments in a human knee, in a game against Idaho, the last game at LaVell Edwards Stadium this past season.

“It’s really frustrating to put in all that effort  …  and then having one play come and wreck your whole season,” Holt said. “It was just overwhelming.”

Doctors told him if he suffered the same injury just 20 years ago, his football career would be over. Fortunately for Holt, advances in science and technology give him the chance to be back on the field for the 2012 season.

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Doctors told him if he suffered the same injury just 20 years ago, his football career would be over. Fortunately for Holt, advances in science and technology give him the chance to be back on the field for the 2012 season.

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Jeff Hurst, an assistant athletic trainer for BYU said the process to repair a torn ACL begins immediately after the injury occurs.

“Austin had a pretty significant knee injury that actually required surgery,” Hurst said. “In that case, we evaluate it on the field, then the doctors take a peek at him and evaluate him as well. Then we talk with Austin and his parents and everybody involved in the process and make a decision based on what we find.”

For Holt, that decision was to go forward with the surgery quickly. His injury happened Saturday afternoon. The next morning, the doctors did an MRI on his knee. On Tuesday, Holt went in for surgery.

“Less than 10 hours after surgery, I was in rehab, trying to get my motion back,” Holt said. “It was the most painful thing I’ve ever gone through in my life, trying to force my leg [to move].”

Holt has worked with Hurst and other trainers to regain his strength and mobility in his knee.

“Our first goal is obviously to get them better and you do that in a lot of different ways,” Hurst said. “With any rehabilitative process you’re going to establish a range of motion, you’re going to control swelling or any inflammation that happens. Once that range of motion happens,that joint moves more freely, everything works better, it’s fixed, it’s proper. Then you can begin a strengthening phase.”

Part of the strengthening phase for Holt is doing physical therapy on Tuesdays and Thursdays. On Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays, he lifts weights with his teammates and goes through more therapy on his legs.

For the first three months after surgery, Holt will work with therapists at a hospital and at BYU. Then he is cleared to work solely with the Hurst and the other trainers on campus.

“When we come here [BYU], I’m already cleared to do light lifting with my legs, running, jumping, little things,” Holt said. “I’ve learned how to walk without a limp. I can jog a little bit. It’s about three to four months to get back into shape, to start running and cutting and doing all that stuff.”

However, the torn ligament alone is not the only thing that needs to be rehabilitated.

“The last 10 percent of any step you take probably is more in your head than in your body because your body responds pretty well but your head is always doubting itself,” Hurst said. “You’ve got to rehabilitate everything.”

When it is all said and done, from injury to playing at full speed, the rehab process will take six to eight months.

“I’ve learned a lot from it but it’s something I don’t wish on anybody,” Holt said. “It’s a major surgery, a major injury. They [doctors] said no matter the best techniques or the best doctors in the world, they can’t get my knee back to the way it was before.  The one thing they will stress very much is the ligament will never be back to the way Heavenly Father created it. The hope is I’ll get back to 90 percent.”

By that time, Holt hopes to be back on the field, helping the Cougars to victory.

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