‘Great results with both surgeries’: N.S. woman grateful for donor-funded technology at QEII

Nova Scotia woman Denise Smith is pictured exercising after having both her knees replaced. (CTV Atlantic)

A Nova Scotia woman is getting her life back following two surgeries at the QEII Health Sciences Centre in Halifax.

Denise Smith says she’s grateful to be moving forward again.

“I’m feeling great,” she says. “And I’m looking forward to, in 2026, being able to fully use my limbs and joints the way they are expected to do.”

Smith had both of her knees replaced at the QEII last year.

“The weakness in my knees and the instability have a great effect on my life,” she adds.

“Your ability to sleep, to eat, to get around – the activities you like to do, it also leads to a lot of pain and difficulty with coping with the pain,” explains orthopaedic surgeon Dr. Michael Dunbar.

Dunbar used a donor-funded orthopaedic robot to assist with Smith’s surgeries.

“The orthopaedic robot, the Maki, in the case of the one I’m using, has been a game changer in that it’s probably the most exciting and the most profound breakthrough in technology in my career,” he adds.

Dunbar says the new technology aids in precision – a tailor-made approach to everyone’s unique needs.

“If you were to leave the garage with the simple analogy of a car tire, you’d want that car tire to align perfectly because if it’s not then the tire may wear prematurely – it’s not unlike that with knee surgery and that we want to hit the absolute right alignment target for the patients so that that knee then lasts longer,” he explains. “And that’s what the data emerging is starting to say.”

Smith says she had “great results with both surgeries.”

“I remember after, when I had my first post-op check up on the first knee, Dr. Dunbar asked me when might I be ready to do the next one, and I asked him what he was doing tomorrow?”

Both Smith and Dunbar say they’re grateful to everyone who supports the QEII Foundation.

“We’re punching way above our weight,” says Dunbar. “We’re actually making significant contributions, not only to patient care, but to research and advancing the field. And it’s allowing us to stay here and play in the big sandbox internationally – and that’s all because of the donors.”

“I am grateful that donors would fund this,” says Smith. “I’m grateful that the hospital would choose to identify this as a fundraising goal. I think it only will impact patient care for the better.”

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