Dangers for BHR patients playing soccer?

[Timo]

Hi,
I am a senior soccer player, age 65, played app. 50 years. My both hips were resurfaced with BHR 6 months ago. Before and after the op I had a program for strenghtening the legs and now they are becoming more or less as before. I started playing basket app. 2 months after the op and now tried soccer already twice. No problems, a little stiff they became but that is normal. I can run maybe better that 5 years before the op. I am planning to go on with it.
My doctor does not recommend any contact sport and will not specify where especially are the dangers. I have studied HIP Talk and saw that people are doing all kind of sports. Could somebody explain, what kind of situations I should avoid when playing?
I would really appreciate your experience and knowledge.
Best regards
Timo

[Pat Walter]

Hi Timo

I am also 65 now.  I had my resurfacing when I was 61.  At this point in life, I am just very grateful to have my active life back.  I feel it is like a second chance.  Because I am older, my view is to be very active - but don't do anything really crazy.  High energy, extreme sports are best left for the younger folks without bad hips.  Please remember that if you have hip problems at your age - the rest of your body is not far behind.  I would suggest you be more conservative in your activities and enjoy your hips a long time.  Contact sports and extreme sports are OK for the young folks, but I even remind them that their hips are metal and you need to keep your bones in good shape to keep the hip device in place. Bone can deteriorate around the components and they can become lose with too much pounding.  Why not take up some other sports where you won't injure your new hips or the rest of your body.  Why take a chance?  Revision surgery is no fun and you will end up with a THR.  So enjoy the hips and take up some less agressive sports.  Listen to your surgeon.  Your bone stock at 65 is not what it was at 40 or even 50.  Be kind to your body.  Input from an aging, conservative woman that has read thousands of stories of even young people that regret the aggressive sports they took up after getting their hips resurfaced.  A few stories are posted about them saying they wish they had remained more conservative.

Have fun.

Pat

[John C]

Hi Pat,
Since it is sometimes hard for some of us to maintain the level of sanity that you propose, could you provide some links to the stories you mentioned about folks who had been too active, and regretted it. It might be good for some of us to read those.

[Lopsided]

Hi Pat,
Since it is sometimes hard for some of us to maintain the level of sanity that you propose, could you provide some links to the stories you mentioned about folks who had been too active, and regretted it. It might be good for some of us to read those.

Yes, I would be interested too.

I have read the story of a famous dancer who had bilateral resurfacing a few years ago, just so he could dance one more time. What happened to him?

D.

[Pat Walter]

Hi

Here is a whole page of revision stories - http://www.surfacehippy.info/hipresurfacingproblems.php

I believe a few people here have posted that they wished they had not done the running, etc that lead to their revisions.  I would have to make a search to find the stories since there are so many.  I'll see if I can find them in a day or so.

Pat

[stevel]

After reviewing HR problems, Jim's revision of a Corwin device by Dr. Gross after 5 years 8 mos was attributed to too much activity.
But what about Cory Foulk?
I wonder if Dr. Gross did Jim's original Corwin device or just did the revision?
Like John C, I find it hard to hold back at age 56 being in good health, with a new LBHR.

[Tommy]

Cory Foulk Is still going strong, he has a great article Post Op Preformance Running that is a must read for everyone. Michael Montgomery who's story is on here has been setting pr's with his hip. Both these guy's were a big help pre and post op for me
           Tommy

[Timo]

Hi Pat!
Thank you for the warnings and recommendations! Obviously you have a huge experience in hip resurfacing questions. Still i am curious also after reading the cases in the list from the link you gave us. There was only one case (Jim 5 years post op) where the cause of the loosening of the BHR could be result of the sport activities. Jim recommended us "not pounding like teenagers since the the BHR may get loose". How did it happen in his case, is not clear. Is it possible to notice loosening at all immediately when it happens ? Or does it happen during a longer period? As a result of what exactly? Is there any data of that?

Anyway I am warned and try to not pound.
Thanks to you.

[Pat Walter]

Hi Timo

I don't know of any studies about extreme sports after hip resurfacing.

I know some people that have had acetabular cup problems have had a slow progression of more and more pain.  Then there are some that just had it start out at a high level.  Everyone is different.  If you had a femur neck fracture - the pain would be really bad.  Some people have actually said they heard a noise and then felt the pain.  Again, they are few and far between.

The few peeople that have had a femur component loosen have had bone deteriorate around the cap.  One person I know developed AVN under his femur cap. That is very unusual.  We all worry about the hip device - but it is the bone growth around the device that we need to worry about.  It is what holds the device in place.  As people have arthritis problems and lose more bone density - the bone growth deteriorates around the components.

Wish I could tell you more, but I can't.

Good Luck.

Pat

[stevel]

Hi Timo,

I found a couple of studies regarding extreme sports:
1.  Metal-on-metal resurfacing of the hip in patients under the age of 55 years with osteoarthritis
2.  Five to eleven year follow-up of modern hip resurfacing:  In patients under the age of 55 years with osteoarthritis

The studies followed 446 BHR or the precursor to the BHR resurfacings (384 patients) for patients under the age of 55 years (at the time of installation) where 55 % participated in impact sports or were involved with heavy occupational work.  Impact sports is defined by the modified UCLA activity scale Level 10 "Regularly participates in impact sports as described above."  Level 9 impact sports is described as "Sometimes participates in impact sports such as running, jogging, tennis, cricket, baseball, rugby, football (soccer), hockey, racquet sports, judo, karate and other martial arts, skiing, acrobatics, ballet dancing, back packing and mountaineering.  Heavy occupational work."

There was only one failure from avn of the femoral head at a follow-up of 5 to 11.5 years.

I was 55 years, 25 days old when I receive my LBHR.  I don't have osteoarthritis in any other joints or have problems with muscles, tendons or ligaments.
The results of these studies is good enough for me to participate in impact sports such as downhill skiing, hunting in the alpine (or mountaineering) and racketball.  I don't run or jog outdoors since I didn't run or jog much before my hip resurfacing.

I don't know of any studies following patients regularly participating in impacts sports who received their BHR (s) at age 65 or greater but if your body is otherwise in great shape - go for it!.

[Timo]

Dear Pat and Steve,

thanks for  the answers! Thank you Steve, especially, for the encouragement.

Based on what I have heard so far, I think that I can do some sport like gentleman soccer, not very extreme actually. My doc says that my bones are OK after 50 years of soccer (and tennis, basket etc) and otherwise also I  am managing physically not so bad.
But I will closely study this site as it appears to be the best in the field. And also provide if I will have any sufficient info to tell people.

So far good luck to all and thank you!

Timo

[stevel]

Hi Timo,

In regards to the 5 to 11 year follow-up study, 55 % of 409 hips (350 patients), means only 175 patients are participating in impact sports.  10 patients (11 hips) died from unrelated causes.  For patients under age 55 at the date of surgery (mean age 48.3), the premature deaths 10/350 or 3 % is startling to me because of their relatively young age.  Presumably they were not mountaineering (e.g. climbing Mt. McKinley) on their new hip(s) and were swept away by an avalanche, slipped and slid into a crevasse or froze to death or had some other improvident event, but if they did, they died doing what they love to do:)

[Timo]

Hi to all!
I got a message from Mike I cannot answer through the site. Decided to give update of my sitution here:
Both hips operated in October 2009. I could play basket after 2 months, soccer after 5 months. 2 weeks ago our team of 60+ years old participated in Finnish championship tournee. Played 5 matches (20+20 min) in two days. We got silver. I played all matches. Legs and back were rather stiff for 2 days after, but obviously that is all damage.
Even fall down several times as it happens. I am a bit surprised about the speed of recovery. Maybe it helps that I started a very intensive training of leg, stomach and back muscules 3 months before the op and continued it starting one week after op.
Cases are of course different and I do not recommen anything. This is just it is going with me. BR Timo