Soon after Amy began figure skating lessons at age 7, the sport became her focus, her purpose, her life. “I am who I am because of ice skating,” says Amy, now 19.

When knee pain took her out of the rink, the skills of orthopedic surgeons and sports medicine physicians at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP) allowed her to return — this time on her own terms. “And I’m really enjoying it,” she says. 

Before her injury, Amy would be on the ice two or three hours a day. Now, inspired by her experience at the CHOP Orthopedic Center, she spends that amount of time in the University of Pennsylvania labs as a pre-med and neuroscience major while also satisfying her love of skating as a member of Penn’s Ice Skating Club. 

Her goal? To be an orthopedic surgeon. “I’d love to be part of the CHOP community someday,” says the Penn sophomore. “We’ll have to see where I end up.”

First major ice skating injury

In her early skating years, Amy had only experienced minor injuries from skating. “I had the classic tailbone bruise from falling, but nothing major,” she says. Then COVID-19 hit, and the Philadelphia Skating Club and Humane Society in Ardmore, the nation’s first skating club and her home rink, closed for months.

“To stay in shape, I did off-ice jumping and exercises in my driveway on concrete — probably not the best surface for knees,” Amy says. “I was also going through puberty, growing a lot and developing into a woman’s body. We eventually got back on the ice, wearing masks and social distancing. That’s when it began.”

Her right knee began to hurt. At first, it was intermittent. She’d rest, and it would feel better. But after a couple weeks of practice, the pain would return. “It’s the leg I land on when I jump,” Amy says. “The pain became sharper.”

She turned to the Orthopedic Center at CHOP for help. 

Conservative treatment initially for symptomatic bipartite patella

An X-ray showed Amy had symptomatic bipartite patella, when a small piece of the kneecap (the patella) is detached and floats in the knee joint. Some children are born with bipartite patella, and it never causes problems. But for Amy, that floating piece was the source of her pain. It’s suspected that the piece broke off during her off-ice workouts or early in her rigorous training when pandemic restrictions eased.

Initially, Naomi J. Brown, MD, a pediatric sports medicine specialist, recommended starting with conservative therapy, which included physical therapy and a corticosteroid injection. The injection helped for a while, but unfortunately the pain returned. A second injection offered only short-term relief. Then, the pain grew even worse.

“We wanted to avoid surgery, if possible, but what we tried didn’t work,” Amy says. “Surgery was the only option.”

Knee surgery to remove the floating piece of patella

In an outpatient surgery, orthopedic surgeon Theodore J. Ganley, MD, director of the Sports Medicine and Performance Center at CHOP, removed a piece of bone about the size of a nickel. Amy was home by lunchtime.

She was a junior at Lower Merion High School and spent the last month of school on crutches. Over the summer she focused on rehabilitation, with physical therapy geared toward the unique movements of skating. 

“I could go upstairs. No pain. I could jog. No pain,” Amy says. Still, she was hesitant to return to the ice. “I was scared I’d be upset by how many skills I’d lost. My mom encouraged me to prepare for the rink’s annual winter show.”

Is skating everything?

The whole experience led Amy to rethink her relationship with skating. “I had grown up with a competitive mindset. I had wanted to compete nationally, and before the pandemic things were going well: I was on track, learning more and more advanced skills,” she says. 

“Then the knee pain wasn’t allowing me to reach my full potential as a skater. I was off the ice for a year, and I felt lost.”

Even after surgery alleviated the pain, “I had a huge mental block that was affecting my skating,” she says. “At one point, I had to decide if I wanted to invest the time and the mental energy if I couldn’t be competitive as I could be.”

After much reflection and recognizing that challenging pre-med classes awaited her at Penn, Amy decided she was ready to transition to a different level of skating. Ice skating became a part of her life, not her whole life.

After a successful freshman season, her competitive ice skating comeback took another blow. Last summer, Amy injured her ankle off the ice.  She again turned to CHOP. After consulting with Dr. Brown and orthopedic surgeon Kathleen Maguire, MD, Amy decided on surgery so she could return to the sport she loves in the fall. She called her first collegiate competition after Dr. Maguire’s surgical repair and a summer of rehab, “a blast.”

And a new opportunity emerged: She worked as a research assistant in Dr. Maguire’s orthopedic lab for six months, building skills for the next phase of her life. She’s hoping to return to CHOP sometime in next few years to shadow one or more of the orthopedic specialists to learn even more.