St. Clair Medical Orthopedic Surgery offers an assortment of advanced surgical techniques and innovative non-surgical treatments to help people regain mobility and improve their quality of life.

Dr. Shaka Walker, MD, one of the founding members of the hospital’s orthopedic surgery group, has been with them for the past 10 years. His group is an established and highly talented one.

“Within our group, we take care of everything from broken bones to include things like hip fractures, wrist fractures and fractures around the shoulder to ligament injuries, meniscus injuries, cartilage injuries, arthritis — of the hip, knee, shoulders and ankle — bunions and diabetic foot infection,” Dr. Walker said. “So, we really do the full spectrum of orthopedics with the exception of orthopedic tumors and then some pediatric orthopedic work in the very young ages.”

Dr. Walker, who began his medical career as an orthopedic surgeon in the United States Air Force, has been practicing in the Pittsburgh region since 2014. He specializes in orthopedic sports medicine; as such, a lot of the patients that he takes care of are local athletes, such as high school and some local collegiate competitors.

There are six other physicians in the orthopedic surgery group: Todd Balog, MD, who specializes in hip and knee replacements and revisions. As an example of his duties, if a patient had arthritis of the hip or knee or had previously had a replacement that has worn out, Dr. Balog would be the person who would manage that. James Mullen, MD, performs upper extremity and hand surgery, which includes things like shoulder replacements, rotator cuff repairs and carpal tunnel releases. Two podiatrists — Dr. Stephen Alayli and Dr. Robert Mendicino — specialize in foot and ankle surgery.  They often take care of ankle fractures, heel bone fractures and other foot fractures, as well as arthritis in those joints, and various ligament injuries of the ankle. They can also help with diabetic foot infections and the condition called Charcot arthropathy.

Richard Mitchell, MD, is the practice’s other sports medicine physician, and he and Dr. Walker do things such as ACL reconstructions, meniscus repairs and meniscus debridement. They can perform shoulder stabilization surgeries and arthroscopic shoulder surgeries, in addition to some foot, ankle and upper extremity areas as well. A seventh doctor, Dr. Carmen Petraglia, is slated to join the St. Clair Orthopedic Surgery in May.  Dr. Petraglia does both cervical and lumbar spinal surgeries, meaning surgeries of both the neck and lower back.

The Orthopedic Surgery group will also soon have the ability to perform diagnostic ultrasounds. This procedure will give the medical team the ability to look at tendons primarily in the hand, the carpal tunnel and shoulder. This will also allow them to perform ultrasound-guided injections in their offices. These injections are precise, office-based procedures using real-time imaging to deliver medications—such as corticosteroids, anesthetics, or hyaluronic acid—directly into joints, tendons, or nerves.

For Dr. Walker on the sports medicine side, he said the diagnostic ultrasounds will give him the ability to do platelet-rich leverage plasma (PRP) injections in the office. This procedure occurs when a patient’s blood is drawn and then centrifuged. The doctors then separate out the platelet and plasma fraction and concentrate the platelets. This can then be reinjected into the patient to reduce inflammation, repair tissue and alleviate pain. This treatment is commonly used for conditions like arthritis of the hip and knee, as well as for tendonitis of the elbow, such as tennis elbow or golfer’s elbow, Walker said.

Dr. Walker noted he is truly proud to be serving the community at St. Clair Health and knows that a positive difference in patient treatment lies in the pride he and the other practitioners feel.

“The biggest thing for us is that St. Clair is a community hospital,” Walker said. “And we very much see our role as providing good service to the community that would be comparable to what they would get if they went downtown to the University hospitals, but in a much friendlier and more personal environment. Our staff are fantastic. They’re very friendly and very easy to work with. The feeling that you get coming into our office is not like going to a typical doctor’s office; people are going to greet you. They’re going to smile, and they’re probably going to know your name. That’s the kind of feel that we try to create because honestly, the medicine is a big part of it, but I think that it’s really the human connection that is the big reason for why we do what we do.”

To check out more about the St. Clair Medical Orthopedic Surgery,
check out their website www.stclair.org/ortho