Jordan Hoover’s archery career almost ended on an icy driveway. Fortunately, a BayCare Clinic orthopedic surgeon helped get Hoover back on target.
Misfortune struck Hoover when he was on a hunting trip with a friend. The two men were removing a snowmobile trailer from a flatbed trailer.
“We were going to take it off the same way we put it on there, which was to pick it up and take it off,” Hoover says.
Hoover's friend slipped on the ice and lost his grip on the trailer.
“I got the full weight of the trailer on me with my arms locked out,” says Hoover, who lives in L’Anse, Michigan. “Ting, ting, ting, pop. It felt like guitar strings breaking in my arms.
“The pain was excruciating.”
Hoover rushed to an emergency room. He was diagnosed with a torn bicep tendon.
That was bad news for Hoover, a competitive archer.
“At one time when I was about 10, I was No. 2 in the state … but I had gotten away from it,” he says. “Leading up to this injury, my wife and I had made the joint decision to commit full-time to me returning to professional archery and then I tore my bicep.”
Hoover waited almost three weeks before he was able to see a specialist in Marquette, Michigan. The visit left him less than impressed.
“I wasn’t comfortable at all with the guy that I dealt with … so we knew when we walked out of there, we had to seek a higher level of care,” he says.
A friend shared that he’d had a good health care experience with providers at Aurora BayCare Medical Center.
“So, I started to look through the staff and I found Dr. Harold Schock,” Hoover says.
Schock is an orthopedic surgeon with Orthopedics & Sports Medicine BayCare Clinic. He practices in Green Bay and Kaukauna.
Hoover was impressed with Schock’s online profile.
Schock is fellowship trained in sports medicine. His expertise includes treatment of common and complex orthopedic issues concerning the foot, ankle, hand, knee, shoulder and elbow. He also offers cartilage restoration and sports medicine care.
“I knew he was the guy,” Hoover says.
Schock's medical background includes treating professional athletes. That also was a selling point for Hoover.
“Plain and simple, you don’t continue to have a career working on professional athletes if you are not good at what you do,” he says.
Schock determined surgery was the best course of action.
Hoover needed left distal bicep tendon repair, an outpatient surgery that reattaches the bicep tendon to the radius bone.
Rehabilitation followed. Schock recommended a physical therapist in Kingsford, Michigan, for that.
“All winter long, I drove twice a week, two hours one way for physical therapy … absolutely worth it,” Hoover says.
Since his successful surgery, Hoover is back in action.
“I have been able to return to my chosen way of life, fully functional … using the arm just like I would have before,” he says.
“The first time I was able to start shooting a bow again … I Robin Hooded one of my arrows from 50 yards away,” Hoover says, explaining how he split one arrow with another. “That was a good gauge for me, too. It told me that I had recovered and that I was going to be OK.”
Proof that he’s OK? Hoover competed in Bowfest, a national archery tournament in Superior, Wisconsin. He placed 23rd.