Medical tourism to the DR is expected to receive a boost with all the attention generated by 2005 Cy Young Award-winning pitcher Bartolo Colon’s rehabilitation treatment. Five years after winning the award, his career appeared to be over after he suffered from elbow ligament and rotator cuff problems.
But he traveled to his native DR for innovative treatment where his fat and bone marrow stem cells were extracted and then injected into his shoulder and elbow resulting in attention-grabbing comeback for the Dominican ball player. Colon, who was considered ready for retirement, was instead given a chance to play again for the Yankees and went an astonishing 8-10 with a 4.00 ERA, with his first half being especially effective at 3.20 ERA and 7 strikeouts in 15 games and 12 starts. The media described how the controversial procedure had worked, evoking images of the pitcher having a bionic arm.
As reported in the San Francisco Chronicle, when the A’s signed the 38-year-old to a one-year, US$2 million deal last month, they looked strictly at those results, rather than concerning themselves too much with the procedure.
The San Francisco newspaper reports that in the new season, Colon will stand out on a young pitching staff. He’s 10 years older than Braden and Brandon McCarthy, the next oldest starters on the staff. And listed at 5-foot-11 and 267 pounds, Colon is round rather than lean.
The newspaper says that the two-time All-Star, Colon has the third-most major-league wins (161) among Dominican pitchers after Juan Marichal (243) and Pedro Martinez (219), and he has been particularly successful pitching in Oakland, where he is 5-1 with a 2.14 ERA.
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