What kind of arthritus?

[bri]

Had a x-ray at the doctors office.Had a large cyst on the top of my femur. The hip cup bone was partially warn away at the top of it because I let it go to long. My question is what type of arthritus do I have. I forgot to ask? Osteoarthritus, Rheumatoid, Displasia, Avascular, Necrosis? My father had both hips done. My brother is having one done in Jan. I do have arthritus in the other and so does my brother, just not as bad. Was very athletic in high school. No known accidents or trama that I know of on the joint.

[obxpelican]

You have osteo, you have cysts because like me you waited a whole and you are bone on bone probably.  Osteoarthritis is generally considered the loss of cartlidge, necrosis

Cysts are usually not an issue with an experienced doctor. Necrosis is the death of your femoral neck usually.


Chuck

[bri]

Is a cyst the death of bone on your femur head?

[bri]

Or is a cyst from the bones wearing away at each other? Are they common? I thought Osteoarthritis is wearing out of the joint and Necrosis is the bone death? Or do I have both?

[obxpelican]

Think of the cyst like a damage area, necrosis is the death of an area of your body, like necrosis of the femoral head is due to the loss of blood usually. Necrosis often results in the catostrophic and painful failure of your femoral neck.  Not a nice thing to happen to you.

Many of us had cysts and yes it's often due to bone on bone damage, your bones were never meant to have their surfaces wear against each other.

Chances are you have osteo and some cysts.  Depending on the size of the cysts they will either bone graft or when your femoral head is ground down the small cysts sometimes are removed by that grinding.

Did your doctor say you might have waited too long?


Chuck

Chuck

[bri]

Yes he said I may have waited to long. Wont know for sure if he can do the resurfacing until he operates.

[Tin Soldier]

Bri - that's too bad.  I don't remember who you went to, but you might consider getting a second opinion.  I hear a fair amount about folks getting a bone graft.  I don't think I was that far along to require it.  I didn't even know that was something that could be done.

My doc and several others that I sent my images (x-ray) to simply used the x-ray to diagnose that I had OA and it was bad enough that HR or THR was in my near future.  It seems like it ought to be a pretty easy to have an MRI sent in digital format.  But then I've never had an MRI.

There's a fair amount of talk about why we have OA and it tends to come down to 2 big fat questions, "Was I too rough on my joints, or is it genetic?"

The nice thing to know is that I don't hear people connecting forms of auto-immune disease or systemic joint problems to OA in the hips.  Certainly folks may have some OA in other joints, but there isn't a group of folks out there saying all of their other joints are all falling apart too.  That was one of my first concerns when this happened to me.  It seems pretty much focused on my two bad hips and that's it.           

[Anniee]

Bri, I agree with Tin that you should get a second opinion.  Dr. Gross will review your X-rays for free.  I don't think he will need the MRI, but if he does, the last one I had was digital, so I assume it could be put on a CD.  I am certainly no expert on cysts, but I do know that some doctors, like Dr. Gross, will do a bone graft for cysts, if necessary, and that resurfacing definitely is still an option.   I just came from his office, and read some of the literature there while I was waiting!