Dr. Michael Meneghini helped launch the orthopedic program at IU Health Saxony in Fishers, and now the Geist resident is celebrating his 10th year with the hospital. He’s a surgeon and the director of the IU Health Saxony Hospital Hip & Knee Center.
Meneghini graduated from the Indiana University School of Medicine in 1999. After helping start the hip and knee program at the University of Connecticut, he returned to Indiana in 2010 when IU Health was building its Saxony hospital.
“They were building this hospital out in Fishers, which at the time was just beans and a dirt field,” he said. “It was a great opportunity to become the director of the orthopedic program here.”
The hospital was completed in 2011, and Meneghini has worked there ever since.
“I like academics. I do research and enjoy teaching, so IU Health is the perfect place to do that,” he said. “Most of the time, those programs are in the downtown hospitals at a medical center but (are) able to do that and start an education program in the hospital in Fishers.”
He said his biggest accomplishment the past decade is bringing the program to the national and international level of recognition.
“Before COVID, we had visitors from all over the world as far away as Japan, and one of our fellows was from Switzerland,” Meneghini said. “Patients from all over the U.S. – Washington state, West Virginia, Florida – all come here to get their hips and knees done and then return back home.”
Within the next 10 years, Meneghini wants to continue to grow the IU Health Saxony Hospital Hip & Knee Center until it is in the top tier of orthopedic programs in the world.
“We are getting close, but our goal was to break into that,” he said. “When people think hip and knee replacement and the top five places, we want to be one of those top five places.”
Meneghini is married to Sarah. He has six children – Ethan, 17, Cecilia, 15, Gianna, 6, Luca, 4, Mario, 3 and Milania, 18 months.
