Knee injuries are some of the most common injuries in football, many times meaning the end of a playing career. That was Alex Pietrzak's fear when he injured his knee as a 14 year-old sophomore playing for Nazareth Academy. Alex made an appointment with Dr. Nikhil Verma, sports medicine specialist at Midwest Orthopaedics at Rush, who found that a piece of cartilage in Alex's knee had torn away from the bone. Fearing that the cartilage would break free causing a "pothole" on the surface of his knee as well as a free floating piece of cartilage, he performed surgery using a biodegradable screw to fix the cartilage back in place.

After several months of recovery the cartilage successfully grew back in place, a result that Dr. Verma hopes will last for many years to come. Alex was also able to not only play again, but succeed at a collegiate level, playing for Northwestern University as an offensive lineman.