On January 6, 2012, my husband, McLain Ward, sustained a traumatic injury while competing in the Grand Prix at the Winter Equestrian Festival in Wellington, Florida. He fell off and was taken out of the competition ring by ambulance. At the hospital, we found out that he had a compound, comminuted fracture of the left patella. Basically, his kneecap was smashed into 22 pieces and was coming out of the skin. This was certainly not a life threatening injury, but for a professional athlete, certainly a career threatening injury. That night he had emergency surgery, it was all a whirlwind, but thankfully the surgery went well. My husband is an extremely intense and driven person to say the least, especially in his career, and 2012 was an Olympic year and as far as we were concerned he WOULD be competing there! We had two people instrumental in McLain’s recovery, Dr. Craig Ferrell and Ed Smith. We needed to find the right person for physical therapy and luckily we heard from basically everyone that Ed Smith at Athletes Advantage was the person we needed to see. So I barged into his office and begged him to take my husband on as a patient. Ed was the person who put more time into my husband’s recovery than anybody. His commitment and expertise were what made it possible for my husband to compete at the 2012 Olympic Games. Ed was able to instill a confidence in all of us that our goal was in fact possible. His years of experience and overwhelming dedication were remarkable. We will forever be grateful to the time, care and knowledge that he gave to us in that time.
