Doctor in Ohio

[Sapita]

Do you have any references from any patient of either Dr. Victor Goldberg at University Hospitals in Cleveland and/or Dr. Peter Brooks at Cleveland Clinic?

I am female, 48 years old and am in terrible constant pain My joint is very stiff.  I feel totally ready for surgery!

My doctor in Dayton, where I live,  has not explained to me the degree of osteoarthritis that I see other people mention in this forum, and he wants to perform a THR.  I have found the two doctors mentioned above, but would like to know if anybody has had surgery or has any references from either of them. 

Very grateful for any response
Sapita

[Pat Walter]

Hi Saptia

I made a reply to your other question already.

I wanted to add some more information for you.

You are way too young to have a THR if you are a candidate for hip resurfacing. There are 2 main reasons to have a hip resurfacing:

1. It is bone conserving. They don't saw off the top of your femur bone, drill it and pound the long stake of a THR device into it. Many people required revisions of their hip replacements.  There is no way to predict how long a hip will last. Some have lasted 30 years or more and other only a few years or less. Normally hip resurfacings are predicted to last 5, 10 15 or more years.  No one really knows.  I have a story from a lady that has had her BHR for over 15 years.  The actual metal hip does not deteriorate, the bone holding the hip will deteriorate and the hip stem or cup will become lose.  Then the pain is normally very bad and a revision is required.

Since you have your complete femur bone left after a hip resurfacing, you can easily have a THR. They will saw off your femur bone to place the long stem of a THR into it.  But, if you already have a THR first, then your next revision is much more difficult. They have to break the bone apart to removed the stem. Them they have to wire the bone around the new stem in place. Here is an illustration of what I am talking about  http://www.surfacehippy.info/thrrevision.php  So each revision of a THR becomes more and more difficult.  Some people end up in wheelchairs since they bones won't support the revisions very well.

So you have a better start with a hip resurfacing because you will have a whole femur bone left if you ever need a revision.  Since you are so young, you could possibly have a revision in 20 or 30 years.

2  Hip resurfacing allows you to do anything you want. There is no danger of a dislocation as in the small plastic/metal old fashioned THR's.  If you can't have a hip resurfacing and end up with a THR, you need to have a large ball type with is either a MOM (metal on Metal) or ceramic on ceramic.  These match the same size as the ball of your own femur bone.  The larger devices are much less likely to dislocate.

I just wanted to make sure you understood why hip resurfacing so important to us surface hippies that have them.  We expect them to last just as long as a THR since the metal is the same as for a MOM and we don't expect to have dislocation problems.

Good Luck and keep in touch.

Pat