ROSA® Knee helped Richard Frampton live the way he wanted to live

Sometimes you don’t know what you’ve got until it’s gone. Turns out, that goes for pain as well as paradise.

For years, Richard Frampton, 60, described his knee pain as “tolerable.” But after recovering from knee replacement surgery that utilized ROSA® (RObotic Surgical Assistant) Knee, a new robotic-assisted joint replacement technology, he realizes how bad the pain had become.

“You can tolerate a lot,” he says. “You don’t recognize it, but it grows in intensity as it goes along. And it’s so gradual you accept it. … The absence of it is a blessing.”

Today, even stairs don’t phase him.

“I’m not taking two stairs at a time like I used to when I was young,” Frampton says. “But there’s no pain.”

Frampton’s knee troubles began on the basketball court.

“I played basketball until I was 50 years old,” he says. “Someone hit me in the knee when I was 48 or 49. I thought I just had a bone bruise, but it never went away.”

The resulting abnormal bone growth from his injury got progressively worse until he finally made an appointment with Robert Tamurian, MD, orthopedic surgeon and medical director of MultiCare’s orthopedic surgery program in the Puget Sound region.

But he wasn’t ready for surgery yet.

“I asked him what my options were,” Frampton says.

Dr. Taumurian offered him injections to help stave off surgery — and that worked for a while.

“But then COVID hit and I wasn’t able to see him for a whole year,” Frampton says.

By then, Dr. Taumurian said it was time for knee replacement and Frampton agreed.

In December 2021 he became one of the first patients to undergo knee replacement at MultiCare Allenmore Hospital with the assistance of the ROSA Knee robotic system. This system is designed especially for knee surgeries and helps surgeons position implants with incredible accuracy and provides them with greater flexibility and precision during surgery.

Frampton said the robotic part was “cool” but not as exciting as discovering what life free of knee pain is like. He works on the factory floor at a Boeing plant and today walks four miles on concrete floors some days.

“Before I had the surgery I’d still be walking, but not that far,” he says. “I’d have to sit down and ice it.”

He acknowledges the first 10 days or so after surgery weren’t exactly fun.

“I was not in my happy place,” he says.

But he only took pain medication for the first four days and relied on ice after that. He stayed home for several weeks before returning to the job.

Frampton says his wife is also happy with the results. She enjoys planning walks to the Nisqually Reach, near their Tumwater home, bike trips and kayak excursions in the San Juans.

“Before my surgery I would just hate going on walks. My balance was terrible. Riding a bike was terrible. My knee didn’t like the kayak,” he says. “Now it’s no big deal. I can go out there and have fun.”

Frampton has Type 2 diabetes and says his blood sugars have tapered down after the surgery, both because he’s able to be more active and because pain itself raises blood sugar. He’s also noticed a general rise in his energy level now that he’s not living with chronic knee pain.

He urges anyone suffering from knee pain to schedule an appointment, even if they aren’t ready for surgery.

“There are options,” he says.

He staved off surgery for three years with injections, but, ultimately, he’s glad he opted for the surgery.

“I have more energy now to do things,” he says. “And that’s the idea. To be able to live the way you want to live.”