Bautista Qatar Crash Update
The sole Suzuki rider in 2011 MotoGP, Alvaro Bautista, underwent another surgery Wednesday evening in Madrid due to internal bleeding in the thigh.
This emergency operation came after the Spaniard had some pins inserted in his femur due to a crash Friday at Free Practice 3 for the opening round of 2011 MotoGP in Qatar.
After the surgery, which occurred at the Hamad Medical Corporation in Doha, Qatar, doctors suspected a “form of compartmental syndrome,” which is caused by bleeding inside the thigh.
Bautista’s doctors made an incision from the MotoGP rider’s hip to knee in order to relieve muscle inflammation. As part of the medical process, this incision remained open for 48 hours, but an attempt to close it was unsuccessful in Doha.
Doctors then rushed Bautista to Mardrid by a special medical aircraft Wednesday evening, and he was then transferred to the Hospital USP San Jose, the treatment center he requested. Bautista then underwent a blood transfusion due to “having lost more than one liter of blood due to the fracture he had suffered.”
After further examination, Dr. Angel Villamor, Medical Director of IQTRA and traumatology at the Hospital USP San Jose, performed a successful surgical procedure “to begin the reduction of the quadriceps muscles which had become herniated through the open incision (which was 6×30 cm on the outer side of the thigh).”
On Thursday, Bautista began his first physiotherapy session, and was reported to be in high spirits. The MotoGP rider will continue to recover, and it is unknown when he’ll return to MotoGP.
Rizla Suzuki has reported that John “Hopper” Hopkins will fill in for Bautista at Jerez MotoGP, which occurs April 1-3.
