Personal profile
Mr Paul Parker is a Consultant Trauma & Orthopaedic Surgeon who specialises in injuries and degeneration of the knee, foot and ankle. Mr Parker holds clinics at both the Woodlands Hospital in Darlington, and at The Priory Hospital in Birmingham.
Mr Parker qualified in Medicine from Queen's University Belfast in 1985. After overseas military service in Central America and Germany, he trained as an orthopaedic surgeon in London, Edinburgh and the US, and became a Consultant in 1998. He is now the British Army’s most senior Consultant Trauma & Orthopaedic Surgeon, and routinely treats military personnel from all over the UK and overseas.
Mr Parker worked as a Consultant at South Tees Hospitals in the North East of England until 2012 when his military career took him to Queen Elizabeth Hospital Birmingham (the UK's largest level 1 trauma centre), now a weekly commute from his home in North Yorkshire. In 2012 he chose to concentrate on lower limb sports medicine, and soft tissue knee and ankle reconstruction. He treats a wide range of sports injuries from a high-level athlete with a knee or ankle ligament injury, to someone who enjoys running or walking and is suffering with shin splints. Having performed hip and knee replacement surgery for over 14 years, he is also keen to use modern joint preservation techniques to prolong the life of the knee and ankle, avoiding joint replacement surgery.
Mr Parker has extensive experience of anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) surgery and revision ACL surgery, and is one of the few Consultant Orthopaedic Surgeons in the UK known for regularly carrying out ankle arthroscopy and ankle ligament reconstruction. Ankle arthroscopy is not performed in many hospitals, however, the particular requirements and specific injury patterns of military personnel mean that he has extensive experience of these procedures.
His specialist interests also include the more general wear and tear problems with the knee, foot, ankle and toes, such as knee or ankle instability, and bunions; and he known nationally for his investigation and successful treatment of plantar fasciitis.
Mr Parker prides himself in providing a bespoke service which is focused on the individual needs of the patient.