In an emotional post on social media, with Vonn finally able to leave hospital care, the 41-year-old - who suffered knee ligament damage a matter of weeks before the Olympic Games opened - said of the horrific injuries that she sustained: “I had a complex tibia fracture, I also fractured my fibula head and everything was in pieces, and the reason it was so complex was because I had compartment syndrome. Compartment syndrome is when you have so much trauma to one area of your body that there is too much blood and it gets stuck. It basically crushes everything in the compartment - muscles, nerves, tendons, it all kind of, dies. Dr Tom Hackett saved my leg, he saved my leg from being amputated.
“He did what is called a fasciotomy, where he cut open both sides of my leg, let it breathe, and he saved me. I always talk about everything happening for a reason. If I hadn't torn my ACL, which I would have done anyway in this crash, Tom [Hackett] wouldn't have been there, he wouldn't have been able to save my leg. I feel very lucky and grateful for him, for this six-hour surgery he put in to rebuild it, which went amazingly well. I was in the hospital a little longer than I hoped because I had very low haemoglobin from the blood loss from all the surgeries.
“I was really struggling, the pain was a little bit out of control and I had to have a blood transfusion. That helped me a lot and I turned the corner and now I am out. I am in a wheelchair right now, I am very much immobile, and I will be in a wheelchair for a while because I also broke my right ankle. I hope I can be on crutches in a little bit but we will see, and I will probably be on crutches for at least two months. But I'll get right to work on rehab and see what I can do and take it one step at a time, like I always do.”
