Scottish international rugby player and firefighter with the London Fire Brigade Jade Konkel knows how to protect herself in a burning building but has struggled to protect herself from injury on the pitch.

Jade - and her surgeon - couldn’t believe it when she injured her ankle three times in less than a year.

In February 2023 Jade, who also plays for Harlequins Women, hurt her left ankle after landing on the back of her leg in a rugby game.

She said: “Initially, although it hurt, I tried to shake it off and carried on playing but in the end I had to come off the pitch. The Quins medical team sent me for a scan and then I was referred to Fortius Foot and Ankle Surgeon Andy Roche. I went to see him and we discussed the options and agreed to go down the surgical route.”

Jade had a syndesmosis injury (also known as a high ankle sprain). She had surgery using a TightRope procedure to anchor the ends of the tibia and fibula together at Fortius Surgical Centre in early February.

Jade went home the same day as her operation and her rehabilitation went smoothly. She was back playing rugby after nine weeks.

She said: “The staff at Fortius made me feel so at ease and they’re so friendly. They kept me informed as to what was going on and when I was in the hospital they would check on me all the time to see if I needed anything.”

Then, after returning to play in May, Jade was tackled and she injured the same ankle by heavily twisting it again. She returned to see Andy.

He said: “Jade was pretty unlucky. The mechanism of injury meant it probably would have happened even if she hadn’t been injured before. She had fractured her fibula and had a syndesmosis injury. We discussed the options once again and agreed to fix the fracture with a lateral fibular plate and restabilise the syndesmosis. The aim was to enable good bone healing while reducing the potential for further instability through the syndesmosis to enable her to return to work with longevity in mind but also continue to play rugby into the future.”

This time the recovery was much more challenging for Jade. She was initially in a cast rather than a boot and she was immobile for longer. She had extra scans so Andy could see how well the bone was healing.

Five months later she was able to play rugby for the start of the season. Then in November 2023 Jade injured the same ankle again, amazingly with the same mechanism. After detailed discussions about treatment options, Andy and Jade decided to restabilise the syndesmosis injury once more and to do a bone graft to strengthen the fibula which had not fully healed.

“I couldn’t believe it when I injured my ankle for the third time,” said Jade. “I was caught at a different angle each time I was injured. I was beginning to wonder if this was going to keep happening again and again. The rehab journey is mentally and physically tough – you don’t get much downtime.”

Jade started playing rugby again after five months and now for the first time in 18 months she feels strong and in a good place. So much so that she got her highest jumps ever in her jump testing.

She said: “I’m concentrating on getting back to playing for Scotland as well as Quins.  And I’m doing as much preparation as I can before I play any games. I built a good rapport with Andy - he made me feel informed and I trusted his advice. He also worked closely with my physiotherapist which helped me as it’s hard to take it all in – particularly because it happened so often!”