Dr Darren Waters

Over the past 3 years, Dr Waters has conducted robotic knee surgery using four different devices. He undertook training in WA & NSW and offers robotic surgery at Western Hospital and Flinders private. Prior to this, utilised computer assisted navigation.

For over 20 years, Dr Waters has used a muscle sparing approach for knee replacements with a high patient satisfaction. To reduce pain and enhance recovery, Dr Waters follows the multi-modal pain management protocol, which utilises wound infiltration with local anesthetic, local blocks, and in some cases spinal anesthetic with light general anesthetic. In most cases a wound infusion of local anesthetic is also used.

From 2015, Dr Waters has been using a muscle and bone sparing shoulder joint replacement prosthesis. This allows minimal bone removal, maintaining bone reserves if further surgery is required in the future.

Dr Waters has been using hamstring reconstruction from 1995, for the anterior cruciate ligament. 5 years ago he modified the technique to allow for thicker grafts by multi-stranding, providing a stronger graft.

Dr Waters is passionate about collecting patient reported outcome measures (PROMS), to assist in improving patient outcomes.

Dr Waters graduated from Flinders University, then gained Fellowship of the Royal Australasian College of Surgeons in 1993. He completed two additional fellowships; the first at North Shore Hospital (Sydney) under the guidance of Dr Michael Tonkin, President of the Hand Surgery Society of Australia, on hand and microvascular surgery. The second, with Perth Orthopaedic and Sports Medicine Centre and the renowned Dr Keith Holt and Greg Witherow, was in sports medicine, focusing on reconstructive knee, shoulder and ankle surgery. He visited centres of excellence in knee and shoulder injury management in the USA and Australia and, more recently, in Paris, London and Zurich to further explore minimally invasive hip and knee surgery, and minimally invasive shoulder arthroplasty.

Dr Darren Waters is focused on research and, notably, created an intra-medullary fixation device (with Dr Anthony Ingman, Austofix) in 1991 that subsequently led to the development of the widely used ‘Humeral Nail’. He has continued his research, with interests in the management of frozen shoulder, and instability surgeries of the shoulder, knee and ankle, and multimodal pain therapy education.

A founding member of Orthopaedics SA, Dr Waters has introduced a range of patient centric services to support fast and convenient appointments. He runs an ‘acute knee and shoulder’ service, consults privately from four of Orthopaedics SA’s locations (North Adelaide, Ashford, Bedford Park, and Henley Beach), and operates from Ashford, St Andrew’s and Western Hospitals. He is a former long-term Director of the Sports Injury Service at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital.