As I feel better I am spending more time on this site looking at others’ stories and wishing I’d done it more from the beginning. I thought I should do a summary of my journey so far, as I’ve found reading others’ helpful.
My hip pain only started in September last year, but it was not bad enough to stop me hiking or doing my normal life. I started physio in Oct and she thought it was just tight muscles. In Jan she ordered an X-ray that showed very slight age related arthritis so we kept working on stretches etc. Late Feb she thought maybe it was bursitis or a torn tendon so she sent me for an ultrasound guided steroid injection, which showed nothing really, and made little difference. By now the pain has moved from the outside of my hip to my groin and down my leg, and was seriously impacting my life. I decided physio was useless, so at a friends suggestion I went to an oestopath, who also was unable to make any difference. In March just as COVID was starting she said that she thought it was time for an MRI as the pain was unrelenting. However it seemed pointless as with all the shutdowns. I knew I couldn’t do anything about any findings they made. I also kept believing that first X-ray, so I thought it was a waste of time.
When restrictions lifted in early May (I am in Brisbane, Australia) I was as ready to do anything to make the pain go away. I was never without pain, I couldn’t sleep or sit long and walking was horrible.After driving I could hardly move the pain was so bad. So i went for an MRA (I think - where they inject contrast into the joint using X-ray guidance) and it showed a really badly arthritic hip - bone spurs, cysts, inflammation of the bone marrrow etc etc - no wonder I was in so much pain- I was bone on bone.
I was lucky enough to be able to see the specialist the next week and he said there was no question I needed surgery. He offered me the option of being part of a trial of ceramic on ceramic hip resurfacing due to my age (56) and gender (female). After lots of reading I agreed. He said that the recovery would be more difficult as it is a bigger incision and has to be done posterior but that it gives a more natural hip and the option of a hip replacement in the future should I need it.
My surgeon only does hips, and he is very big on education so he has an app that you use every day with videos of everything from coping with anxiety to demonstrating how they insert a cannula. It was good because when I went into surgery there were lots of familiar faces from the videos.
I got quite stressed leading up to the surgery because I discovered that joint replacement wasn’t included in my health insurance ( I had changed my cover in November to try and save money and I didn’t think I had any joint issues (!!!). Fortunately we had just received a small inheritance, and life wasn’t worth living with the pain so we paid the money. Being on the trial helped as the prostheses was only $7000 and alll up the op cost about $20 000 - a totally worthwhile investment in quality of life. It probably would have cost about $10 000 with insurance as they don’t normally cover trial prosthesis, so I felt fine about it in the end.
I was also surprised how stressed I got about COVID. in Queensland we have virtually no cases and there hasn’t been community transmission (we are so lucky, being able to close our boarders and shut down quickly made an incredible difference). But they asked so often about any cold or flu symptoms I got really overwhelmed paranoid that I unknowingly had it and that I would be in the news as the patient who shut down a hospital (totally irrational, which I knew but couldn’t seem to shake). Anyway once it over I stopped worrying about that, though it was very strange having so many people so close to me after months of isolation. I think maybe I was really anxious about the surgery but redirected it to COVID-19 for some reason.
Sorry - this is turning into a novel. I’ll post this and describe my recovery in the next post.