National Football League

Cowboys assistant back at work after medical scare

Published Dec. 30, 2009 7:13 p.m. ET

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Cowboys special teams coach Joe DeCamillis was happy to be back at work Wednesday following emergency surgery to remove his appendix - and the discovery that he needed a hernia repair, too.

``It was actually 2-for-1 is what the (doctor) called it,'' DeCamillis said. ``I don't seem to do anything easy lately that's for sure.''

DeCamillis broke his neck when the team's indoor training facility collapsed in May, soon after he was hired. A little more than two weeks after undergoing surgery to fuse vertebrae in his neck, DeCamillis was on the field for the start of summer workouts, wearing a neck brace and using a bullhorn to conduct drills. He's still not fully healed, although he has not let that injury slow him.

``I think my family is really going to be glad when 2010 gets here, that's for sure,'' he said. ``But you never know. You never know what that brings too. Hopefully it'll be a little bit easier as far as the health issues.''

DeCamillis said his stomach started hurting Sunday morning at the team hotel, hours before the Cowboys faced the Washington Redskins.

``I kept thinking it was going to get better and it never got better,'' DeCamillis said. ``That's when we went to the hospital. ... It was a feeling of 'Oh, no, I can't believe this.' I don't think that was exactly the words I used, but that was definitely the feeling I used.''

The toughest part might've been watching Dallas' 17-0 victory over the Redskins on television.

``I'm sure when (hospital workers) heard some of the words that were coming out of my mouth in that room, they were probably a little bit concerned,'' he said. ``But it worked out OK.''

DeCamillis wasn't about to take any extra time off to recover, not with Dallas going into the season finale needing a win over Philadelphia on Sunday to clinch the NFC East.

``I'm feeling OK, a little bit rough around the edges,'' he said. ``This is what I do. We've got a chance to win a division championship this week, so I guess selfishly I don't want to miss it. We've got to win this game somehow. I knew that if I felt like I could do it, I could do it and I feel like I can do it.''

Coach Wade Phillips said it wasn't easy during practice Wednesday.

``He's hurting today,'' Phillips said. ``I worried about him that way. We got him off the field as soon as we could. He's pretty sore.''

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