ABOUT DR Corne
Dr Ackermann has a special interest in problems of the arm (upper limb). She specialises in arthroscopic surgery of the shoulder, elbow, and the wrist.
She completed her medical studies at the University of Pretoria. Dr Corne then went on to specialize in orthopaedic surgery at the same institution. By 1999 Dr Corne qualified as an Orthopaedic Surgeon and went into private practice in 2000.
Arthroscopic surgery always had a special allure to her. The surgery is minimal invasive, leaves small scars and does the least amount of soft tissue damage. This allows the patient to recover from surgery much quicker. It has the distinct advantage that the surgeon is able to look inside the joint and see what condition of the cartilage of the joint is. Cartilage cannot be seen on ordinary X-rays. Although she also did arthroscopies of the knee and ankles, she had a special liking for performing scopes of the shoulder, elbows, wrists.
Soon most of her practice comprised of patients with shoulder problems. This included the young sportsman that injured an area referred to as the labrum. Injuries to this part of the shoulder should only be repaired by arthroscopic surgery. As she got handier she was also able to fix rotator cuff muscles tears in the older patients without having to perform open surgery. She is well experienced in treating the full variety of shoulder problems, in young and old.
She noticed that some patients had elbow pain that originated within the elbow joint itself of which ordinary investigations (X-rays & sonar) could not always assist in the diagnoses. Though technically much more challenging than shoulders, she started performing elbow arthroscopies and discovered that the elbow holds many more pathology than appreciated.
Accurately diagnosing pathology of the wrist had been very challenging 15 years ago. MR imaging was not that advanced at that stage. It was often very difficult to make a diagnosis in a patient that had chronic wrist pain. To find answers Dr Corne decided to do arthroscopies of the wrist. Being able to appreciate the condition of the cartilage, and the ligaments with the arthroscope, she was able to treat wrist pathology much more effectively.
She delivered two presentations on the advantages of performing wrist arthroscopies and the treatment of tri-fibrocartilage complex tears at the annual South African Society for Surgery of the Hand in 2002 and 2004.
She practiced in the Ermelo, Trichardt, Secunda, Evander area until 2010 and then decided to move to the Public sector.
At Rob Ferreira Hospital she became more involved in administration and management. As an outflow of this she left Public Service and became involved with the opening of a new private hospital in Mbombela. But by the start of 2015 she was ready to return to her field of expertise as an orthopaedic surgeon.