Yesterday I had a CT guided injection into the psoas tendon to (hopefully) give me some pain relief. The surgeon wanted to see me an hour after the procedure as well. The radiologist said that I should get some immediate relief from the Novocaine, then it would wear off and the pain may return. He said that the steroid may take a few days to take effect.
The injection procedure went fine - it wasn't painful at all - just a little pressure feeling from the medication being injected. Unfortunately, as time went on, the pain started to get worse. So by the time I saw the doctor, the pain was worse than before the injection. The surgeon was really hoping that I would get some relief as his initial thought was the psoas was rubbing against the edge of the cup as to him it looks like the cup is sticking out a bit. By the time we arrived back home, I felt so bad I sat down in my recliner and fell asleep.
I don't think that now he really has any idea of what the issue may be. He has ordered blood work to check for infection. I told him that I had this bloodwork back in July and everything was normal. His only reply was "that was then, not now"; along with "well, you are coming up on a year". (so at the 1 year day am I going to wake up and have a perfect hip?) So I guess it's back to square one with him. It's a 4 hour round trip to see him, so I'm not sure at this point if I want (or should) continue to take a full day off of work for an appointment. I guess I'll wait and see what he says when after he gets the blood test results.
@Josephine, do you have any other suggestions/thoughts? Here's where I'm at currently:
Had epidural in back at L4/L5 to see if hip/groin pain was being referred from a couple of bulging disks I have. This provided no pain relief.
Had femoral and obturator nerve block - this gave me 3 days of pain relief. The pain management doctor said that this means the problem is in the hip (most likely muscle related) and if I get more nerve blocks that I am only masking the issue.
Has psoas tendon steroid injection - no immediate pain relief as should have been expected.
I know that I can have surgery with revision surgeon #1 to remove the screws in the cup, but unfortunately he does not know if this will resolve any of my pain. He also was contemplating adjusting the angle of the cup, but never made any definitive decision on this. In some ways I felt as he may have been rushing to surgery.
Revision surgeon #2 - he is trying to avoid surgery (which is OK, but if it's needed, then it needs to be done). Even though he has many more years of experience than surgeon #1, I think he is totally baffled by this and he won't even give me a hint of future treatment at this point.
I would think that if the screw(s) in the cup were causing pain then wouldn't the psoas injection have provided some relief??
To say that I'm at a total loss as to what to do next is truly an understatement. I told the surgeon yesterday when he asked how this was affecting my life, that the active life that I knew and loved ended the day that I had my hip replaced.
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