Yahoo News Al Roker Gives Recovery Update After Knee Replacement Surgery: 'This One Is a Little More Complicated'
"I'm hoping, maybe sometime in the next two weeks, to be back," Roker told his colleagues on Today Monday
Al Roker made a virtual appearance on the Today show Monday morning, to update viewers on the status of his recovery after undergoing knee surgery.
The longtime weatherman — who is taking time off from the NBC morning show after going under the knife on May 9 — called in to catch up with Savannah Guthrie, Hoda Kotb, Craig Melvin and Dylan Dreyer.
"It's Monday, I'm home from the hospital," he joked. "Just another day!"
Asked how his recovery was going, Roker, 68, told his friends and colleagues that his knee was still feeling "stiff."
"This one is a little more complicated because it's what they call a revision; it was a replacement of a replacement, so they had to take stuff out, put stuff in, so it was a bit of a bear," Roker said. "So we've just been kind of hanging out. Chilling out, not doing anything — which I know, a lot of people find hard to believe, but in fact, that is the case."
The downtime has given him the chance to catch up on his favorite TV shows, Roker said, including Mrs. Davis,The Madalorian, and Poker Face. He also said that he's been spending time with family, including son Nick — who just returned home from college — and wife Deborah Roberts, whose book about teachers just landed on the New York Times Best Sellers list.
"I was being wildly optimistic that we were going to go to one of our [favorite restaurants], Daniel, for Mother's Day, which is kind of our tradition. But that was not realistic, so we ordered in some quiche and some stuff and just had a nice meal in the backyard here," Roker explained. "Which was nice, because it was a gorgeous day yesterday."
Related:Al Roker Is Taking Time Off for Knee Replacement Surgery, Enjoyed a 'Last Walk' Before the Procedure
As for a return to Today, Roker said he still has some work to do, including "three days a week of physical rehab that'll go on for a few months."
"I still don't know, I'm hoping, maybe sometime in the next two weeks to be back," Roker said. "We'll just play it by ear every day. And that's the thing. And yes, I know I'm not going to use back before I have to."
Elsewhere on Today Monday, Roker thanked his "great "doctor, Dr. David Mayman, and "all the nurses and staff at Hospital for Special Surgery" who "were all terrific."
This is Roker's second knee replacement surgery. The first was in April 2022, while the second had to be delayed when Roker was hospitalized due to blood clots in his leg and lungs.
He was out of work for two months following the health scare, before returning to Today in early January. "Look, I had two complicating things," Roker said then. "I had blood clots, which they think came up after I had COVID in September. And then I had this internal bleeding going on, I lost half my blood. They were trying to figure out where it was."
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Roker was being treated at New York-Presbyterian/Weill Cornell Medical Center. Through surgery, his medical team discovered he had two bleeding ulcers. Doctors resectioned his colon, took out his gallbladder and operated on his duodenum, part of the small intestine.
"I went into for one operation, I got four free," joked Roker. "So I got that going for me."
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