I had left hip resurface done on Friday morning Sept. 11 by Dr. Ball at Thorton Hospital in La Jolla, CA. I am 5 days post op now and recovering right on the beach at a condo this week. Then headed back to Phoenix.

I can walk with weight bearing on crutches and have seen an in home PT already. I do a series of 10 or so exercises lying down and a few standing up. I walk about a mile a day now. I  haven't used the narcotics since the first night. I don't have pain and I think a little pain is better than the side effects of the narcotics.

The Thorton hospital is beautiful. I thought I was walking into the Ritz Carlton Hotel reporting for surgery. My wife told me they had a strings concert in the hospital lobby on Friday afternoon. But hey it is La Jolla.

The PT who came to the condo said Dr. Ball is noted for good outcomes. That was good to hear.

All in all I am off to a great recovery and looking to get back to work, golf, and basketball in that order.

wow- you sound like you are doing great!  I am one month post op today (female/44/ birmingham left hip resurface) and every day brings great new "hey I can do this again!" moments.  If you are already walking a mile at day 5 you are surely in great shape.  I was three week before I hit the mile place!  best of luck and glad you had a beautiful setting in which to have your surgery.

lyn

Hey Medgerton,  10 months ago I had both hips resurfaced by Dr. Ball and just couldn't believe the whole experience. Thornton hospital is a great place to have surgery and as far as Dr. Ball goes , he is just an incredible surgeon and person altogether. My outcome and recovery has been way better than I could have ever imagined. To be honest I feel so normal now it never even feels like I ever had surgery to begin with. Hope your recovery continues to go well and your life returns to normal again.

Wayne

Quote from: ladler on September 15, 2009, 08:24:06 PM
wow- you sound like you are doing great!  I am one month post op today (female/44/ birmingham left hip resurface) and every day brings great new "hey I can do this again!" moments.  If you are already walking a mile at day 5 you are surely in great shape.  I was three week before I hit the mile place!  best of luck and glad you had a beautiful setting in which to have your surgery.

lyn

We will get the same pace just at different speeds. I am an athlete 53 yrs old and want to return to my sports again. Thank God for this type of surgery. I was an "ideal" candidate and things are going good so far. Best of luck in your recovery.

Quote from: wayne-0 on September 15, 2009, 11:37:31 PM
Hey Medgerton,  10 months ago I had both hips resurfaced by Dr. Ball and just couldn't believe the whole experience. Thornton hospital is a great place to have surgery and as far as Dr. Ball goes , he is just an incredible surgeon and person altogether. My outcome and recovery has been way better than I could have ever imagined. To be honest I feel so normal now it never even feels like I ever had surgery to begin with. Hope your recovery continues to go well and your life returns to normal again.

Wayne

I hope to get to the place you are at now. Congrats on the hard work to recover to that point.  I really like Dr. Ball and his staff. I am recovering in Pacific Beach. My brother has a condo right on the Ocean. Very nice.

Hi Medgerton, Great to hear of your good outcome. Another happy Dr. Ball patient here. I wrote about my experiences with Dr. Ball and the nice facilities at Thornton in Pat's Hip Stories section (under Dr. Ball patients).
A few more similarities: I also traveled from Phoenix to San Diego for the surgery. And I too had very little pain post-op and didn't need the oxy-contin/codone after the first day or 2.
Like Wayne-O, I'm a bilat, and also I'm very pleased with my outcome. It really is a chance to get an active life back.
Hint: I did take an oxycontin for the car travel back from San Diego. Not sure if I needed it, but I didn't want the jostling to catch up on me.
Enjoy your recovery,
-Dirk

Quote from: DirkV on September 16, 2009, 10:58:15 PM
Hi Medgerton, Great to hear of your good outcome. Another happy Dr. Ball patient here. I wrote about my experiences with Dr. Ball and the nice facilities at Thornton in Pat's Hip Stories section (under Dr. Ball patients).
A few more similarities: I also traveled from Phoenix to San Diego for the surgery. And I too had very little pain post-op and didn't need the oxy-contin/codone after the first day or 2.
Like Wayne-O, I'm a bilat, and also I'm very pleased with my outcome. It really is a chance to get an active life back.
Hint: I did take an oxycontin for the car travel back from San Diego. Not sure if I needed it, but I didn't want the jostling to catch up on me.
Enjoy your recovery,
-Dirk

Will do. I am going to try the ride home without the pain killers. Only Tylenol.

Quote from: DirkV on September 16, 2009, 10:58:15 PM
Hi Medgerton, Great to hear of your good outcome. Another happy Dr. Ball patient here. I wrote about my experiences with Dr. Ball and the nice facilities at Thornton in Pat's Hip Stories section (under Dr. Ball patients).
A few more similarities: I also traveled from Phoenix to San Diego for the surgery. And I too had very little pain post-op and didn't need the oxy-contin/codone after the first day or 2.
Like Wayne-O, I'm a bilat, and also I'm very pleased with my outcome. It really is a chance to get an active life back.
Hint: I did take an oxycontin for the car travel back from San Diego. Not sure if I needed it, but I didn't want the jostling to catch up on me.
Enjoy your recovery,
-Dirk

Dirk,

Who did your PT in Phoenix?

Mark

Hi Mark, Standard protocol was few weeks of in-home PT - I think it was Gentiva. This seemed like basic stuff to get your muscles firing again. I wanted to get back to some more rigorous activities and after a couple months also did outpatient PT at Foothills Sports Medicine. I did get a prescription for the outpatient PT, so that was nice.
Sent you a PM with more specifics. Good luck, and enjoy your recovery!

-Dirk

Dr. Ball did my right hip June 5th.  It is amazing to me that they can put such a large chunk of metal inside your boday and have it barely hurt at all.  I am alergic to most pain killers, so I just took Darvocet for a few days and changed to Tylenol after that.  After a couple weeks I quit taking any medicine at all.  I just had my four month follow up appointment last week and everything looks good.

I may have taken that good news a little to far.  Apparently, walking five miles at a very brisk pace was still a little much for me.  I had a lot of tightness and some pain early this week (less than before surgery).  After listening to my body and taking it easy for a few days, I am back to pain free.  My range of motion when my knee drops to the inside is not great, but every other direction is great. 

I hope I never have to have the other side done, but if I did I would go back to Dr. Ball and Thornton Hospital.

Missed you by a week. I was in yesterday for my one month checkup.

I did the same thing as you. At 3 weeks post op I was feeling good so I took a 3 mile hike with moderate elevation changes. People tell you to take it easy because even though you feel good your muscles/tendons etc are not up to speed yet. So, needing to test that idea I took my hike. Half way through I said to myself - this is a bit much. the problem is I had to hike back.

I strained my quad pretty good and this made it painful to walk. Luckily I am in PT so for the past week they worked on it. I am almost over that now.

My hip is really solid. I did ask Dr. Ball how is it possible that after all that cutting/twiisting/dislocating/grinding/drilling/pounding is it possible to have no pain in the hip post op. He said some people are like that while others have pain while recovering. I am glad I am in the former category.

Me too.
I had arthroscopic surgery on my left knee ten years ago to repair meniscus tears and to do a lateral release which are not that big of a deal in comparison to your thorough description :) of our hips and my knee was much more painful.  Dr. Ball's staff said that knees tend to be more of an 8 or a 9 on the pain scale while hips tend to be more of a 4.  Thank goodness.