10 days to go!

[Maggie]

I am about to have my first hip resurfacing (LBHR) at Robert Jones and Agnes Hunt Orthopaedic here in the UK. My surgeon is Prof James Richardson. I was born with a CDH and I have been on a downward spiral for the last 15 years. A couple of arthroscopy "tidy-ups" helped keep me going, but when I reached the final bone on bone stage with bone cysts earlier this year we decided to go ahead. Resurfacing had obviously been my preferred surgery ever since I first heard of it years ago and whilst I feel a little nervous about the experience I feel very positive about the actual procedure and my surgeon. I have found many of the posts here helpful, thank you to you all! I have no symptoms in my right hip at the moment, but on x ray it looks nearly as bad as the left. Anecdotal stories I have been told suggest it may become painful once the left one is done, has anyone experienced this?
Thanks
Maggie

[Pat Walter]

Hi Maggie

Welcome to Hip Talk.

You will find all kinds of aches and pains showing up all over your body after your hip resurfacing.   Your good hip gets a beating because it has to compensate for you bad hip.  Many of us have knee pain and back pain also because our bodies are not balanced properly when you have to compensate for a bad hip.

It even takes your body some time after surgery to try to get back to normal.  I have problems with my other hip, but Dr. De Smet tells me it is not time to have it done.  I seem to be having a lot of bursitis in my unoperated hip.  My operated hip is great at 1 1/2 years.

A lot of us including me have a close relationship with our chiropractors.  Years of walking improperly with the bad hip is very hard on the back.  I also feel so much better after seeing the chiropractor.  I still have my back spasm and it puts me down for a few days.

Usually if you have osteoarthritis in your hip - it is probably a pretty good bet that it is going to show up in other places in your body.  But pain from your hip is terrible and for me, the strongest meds would not help.  The new BHR is great and the bad pain was gone right after surgery.  I had an easy and quick recovery like many of the De Smet hippies.  I was on one crutch at 4 days and none at 4 weeks.  I did not need any strong pain meds after I left the hospital in 2 1/2 days.  I took mostly ibuprophen to help with the sore muscles and incision tenderness. The arthritis terrible pain will be gone.  It is amazing.

I hope you have a quick and easy recovery.

Do you know how many hip resurfacing Mr. Richardson has done to date?  I would like to add that to my info.

Also I hope you will write a small story for us about your hip resurfacing when it is done.  It helps people learning about hip resurfacing and also helps people to learn about your doctor.

Good Luck.

Pat

[Maggie]

Hi Pat,

thanks for your thoughts and good wishes. I too have problems with both my knees and back, plus I have already had a right wrist fusion, and stress fractures in my right foot from my terrible gait so I am well versed with the knock on effects of problems in one part of the body on other areas. My wrist has got much more troublesome since I have been having to use a walking stick all the time (though I have a "shock absorbing one" now with a gel handle that is great!) I am curious if the pain in my worst hip is simply masking pain in the "good" one! I'll find out soon enough I guess!

I am not sure how many resurfacings Prof Richardson has done, other than it is a lot! They are doing atleast one a week in his clinic and he has been doing them for many years now, infact he is rarely actually lead surgeon these days, as he trains other members of his team the technique under his supervision. I will find out the figure for you though. I believe Mr McMinn trained the Prof originally.

I will be happy to write a piece about my experience when it is over, it is certainly interesting to compare how things are handled in different countries and by different surgeons. I feel very lucky to be having this performed "for free" here under the care of the NHS for example.

Maggie

[Pat Walter]

Hi

I will look forward to hearing more about your surgery.  Let's hope your body will feel much better when you have recovered from your surgery. 

I was lucky to use one elbow crutch 4 days after surgery.  I hope you will be able to do that too and it isn't your bad wrist.  I liked the elblow crutches that they used in Beligum.

I ended up in Belgium because I did not have health insurance and could not afford surgery in the US.  My husbands company went out of business and dropped our health insurance without us knowing about it.  When we found out and tried to get more insurance, we were in 61 and 60 with too many pre-existing conditions.  Me with a bad hip and my hubby with one heart attack already.  So we could not get insurance.  He had a heart attack with a triple bypass and the bill was $104,000 a few months after we lost our insurance.  Since he was without a job and we are not wealthy, the hospital wrote our bill off to charity for us.  We were very lucky.

It cost us $18,000 to come to Belgium to get my new BHR with Dr. De Smet.  $13,500 for all the medical part and the rest for plane fare, housing and food.  It was a wonderful trip - the adventure of a lifetime.  We both loved Belgium. We had never traveled before.  Now I have to spend the rest of my life trying to pay off all the credit card debt. I am very happy with my BHR and would do it again if I had to.

Good Luck.

Pat