Robert Cunningham, MD, completed the first surgery in Colorado's Vail Valley with the Bridge-Enhanced ACL Restoration procedure.
The BEAR procedures uses a patient's own blood to repair their ACL. Dr. Cunningham completed the procedure at Vail Valley Surgical Center in Edwards, Colo.
"In the past, the biggest barrier to ACL repair was the poor blood supply and lack of a healing scaffold to allow the patient's native ACL to heal," Dr. Cunningham said in a Jan. 20 news release. "With newer micro-surgical instruments and implants, a torn ACL can more frequently be saved and repaired instead of removed and reconstructed with a tendon graft."
Dr. Cunningham is Frisco, Colo.-based Vail-Summit Orthopaedics & Neurosurgery's longest tenured orthopedic surgeon.