I had a complex broken elbow. Dr. Ruhlman provided excellent care, surgery, and has worked with me to help rehabilitate. His office has also been a pleasure to work with, offering additional referrals and assistance that my primary care physician couldnt provide. I highly recommend Dr. Ruhlman and Orthopedic Specialists of Seattle.

Dr. Ruhlman is one of the best in Seattle at what he does. My child had an elbow break from 12 feet up. Another hospital wanted to just cast it and wait to see what happened, but it did not heal correctly and I wanted an answer. I saw Dr. Ruhlman for a second opinion. I would not go anywhere else for any arm injury. He was able to fix the bone, and most importantly, straighten my son’s arm. I went to Seattle orthopedic center for another injury as well, and I gave them my absolute highest recommendation.

We love Dr Ruhlman! Our family has seen him for two different fractures and one in-office surgical treatment and have been very happy with the outcome and the process. For the most recent fracture, we were confused by the ERs report which had misdiagnosed which bone my son had broken, and he was so patient and gracious in making sure we understood the correct diagnosis. I really appreciated that.

The best surgeon I could have hoped for. Dr. Ruhlmans approach to recovery is a little more aggressive than some others, but it paid off in spades. I recovered from a bimalleolar fracture and subsequent surgery (one 5 metal plate fixation and 8 screws) much quicker than the average. It blew my physical therapists mind and 3 months to the day (post-op) I was on a 20+ mile backpacking trip. I hope to never have another fracture that requires surgery, but if I do, I sure hope Dr. Ruhlman will be the one to fix me.

I went back to the clinic for a consult for surgery January 4th at 1:45pm. I sat in the patient room for 1 hour and 15 mins and the doctor never showed up so I left the room and went into the hallway to find somebody to just give me my paperwork and mri so I could go to a different orthopedic surgeons office because the amount of unprofessionalism that I experienced was unlike in doctors office I’ve ever been in. The lady spoke to didn’t apologize, didn’t ask if there was anything she could do to make the situation better or to even get the doctor. She gave me my paperwork but wouldn’t give me a copy of my mri. She said if I wanted that I had to go to the front desk. I went to the front desk and she said she would go back to that lady and get my mri on a disk. She said it would take her 5 min and she would be right back, so I waited for 15 min and I still didn’t get them. So I left.

Be aware that this practice has no regard for your/the patients time. Dr. Ruhlman fired me today because I objected to waiting 25 minutes in the exam room after also waiting in the lobby. His staff came in twice to tell me he was with his previous patient and actually brought me a $5 Starbucks card (apparently they are prepared for these delays) and a glass of water. This experience was after 8 sessions of PT where I was consistently brought in 5-10 minutes after my appointment time. Qualified individuals, but very poor time management. Expectations for doctors, PTs and dentists should be the same as with any other business personnel - thats what appointments are for and important to respect each others time.

Update—-11-28-2017. While my hand is still functional. The numbness remains...thankfully the pain is still at bay as a result of Dr McCallister’s repair and additional work which should have been part of the initial procedure...removal of osteophytes. I wrote a letter to Ruhlman to which he never paid the courtesy of a reply. It turns out his method for the procedure is not the preferred one and is seldom used for the vary reason of complications of injury to the radial nerve. Make sure he listens and addresses every issue. Its taken me a painful year to overcome a surgery performed on my wrist and other issues. On top of the initial problems, he further complicated the issue by doing two injections into the very sites with steroids which should not have been performed...only a year later did I learn of that error.I went to another surgeon who listened and worked to resolve the problems. I now have a fully functioning left hand again. The first surgery damaged and scarred the radial nerve resulting in nearly a year of painful burning over the top of almost my whole hand. The nerve was not part of the surgery procedure. There should have been one surgical session and two incisions. I have four now including the resection of the radial nerve. A CT scan should have been performed but only table top office xrays were taken.