Chocoholic
new member
- Joined
- Jul 30, 2022
- Messages
- 9
- Age
- 52
- Country
- United States
- Gender
- Female
Hello everyone, I‘ve been lurking for a while. I had my RTHR on July 15th. It was kind of unexpected and an arduous journey to find myself in this position.
I‘ve been having some mechanical problems like locking and sudden pain for over a year. I was diagnosed with Psoriatic arthritis in 2020 and have been seeing a rheumatologist every 4 months since.
He ordered x-rays last year, noticed some “degenerative changes” and sent me to physical medicine. They said the hip was fine but wanted to get an MRI of my spine since I’ve had kyphosis and scoliosis since childhood and they thought the pain was coming from that. My insurance didn’t want to approve until I had physical therapy.
So I went and mentioned my hip pain since PT couldn’t find anything specifically wrong in my back. He thought it was strong. Did some therapy on my hip for not quite 4 weeks and he said I was done ( it didn’t really help much). Never heard back from the doctor so I said to myself forget it. Had other health issues cropping up that were more urgent.
Fast forward to last December at another check up my rheumatologist noticed how my ROM and pain had gotten worse so he referred me to an OS suspecting bursitis. Again had trouble with insurance, they weren’t accepting it even though they were still listed under in network. But the entire orthopedic department had merged with another one that didn’t accept this insurance.
I let it go for a bit since it was the end of the year anyway and a new deductible had to be met in the new year.
Finally in early April I called again and they now took my insurance. Went to see the OS and he thought it was a torn labrum since the x-ray looked “fine“ according to him and “I wouldn’t need a hip replacement or anything”. Sent me for a contrast MRI and that confirmed his suspicion. At the follow up he just burst in the room 45 minutes late and said he meant to contact me not to come in since it was a torn labrum that needed arthroscopic surgery and he doesn’t do that. He referred me to another doctor within his company who specializes in arthroscopic surgery.
When I saw that OS and relayed my experience he asked if that other doctor had looked at my MRI. I said, I did know, he didn’t show me anything, maybe he just read the radiologist summary. This new OS said it wasn’t as simple and that on top of the torn labrum I also had a bone cyst and also cartilage loss. A positive outcome of arthroscopic surgery was therefore not very likely. Taking into account my age he thought a THR would be a better way to go. Of course I was dumbfounded, this coming out of left field.
Seeing my hesitation he recommended getting a second opinion from another OS who does joint replacement. He felt the first surgeon might not wanted to consider it because of my age and he usually works on older patients.
So I started doing some research into the subject and also came across this forum. I found reassurance that this is definitely not something too unusual and the artificial joint could last a long time. I figured I’d rather have good life quality than bad quantity.
The new OS turned out to specialize in hip preservation and would also do joint replacement if warranted. He initially thought we could try for some preservation approach with arthroscopic surgery first and the viscosupplementation. He did sent me for a CAT scan with MAKO profile though to get some better idea of joint space. That CT revealed FAI and that was most likely the cause of the torn labrum.
He then decided that there were too many areas to fix arthroscopically and it wouldn’t buy me more than a couple of years and a THR would indeed be more beneficial.
So here I am 2 weeks post op. I was scheduled for same day surgery but initially didn’t pass PT eval because of dizziness and nausea. Ended up having to spent 2 nights because my bp started to plummet because of blood loss.
Recovery has been going ok, still dealing with low bp. Pain has been tolerable but I’ve been having quite a problem with muscle pain on the side and top of my thigh. Especially trying to sit putting weight on the thigh the muscles get compressed and it’s quite painful.
PT said he sees that quite often in younger, fitter patients as their muscles react stronger to trauma. Not sure if that is true or he’s just trying to make me feel bette, lol.
Anyway I guess time will tell. I was supposed to transition from walker to cane this week but with having that muscle pain he felt that was not stable enough so for now walking with one axle crutch instead.
I’m seeing my OS on Monday for the 2 week follow up. Let’s see what he says.
I‘ve been having some mechanical problems like locking and sudden pain for over a year. I was diagnosed with Psoriatic arthritis in 2020 and have been seeing a rheumatologist every 4 months since.
He ordered x-rays last year, noticed some “degenerative changes” and sent me to physical medicine. They said the hip was fine but wanted to get an MRI of my spine since I’ve had kyphosis and scoliosis since childhood and they thought the pain was coming from that. My insurance didn’t want to approve until I had physical therapy.
So I went and mentioned my hip pain since PT couldn’t find anything specifically wrong in my back. He thought it was strong. Did some therapy on my hip for not quite 4 weeks and he said I was done ( it didn’t really help much). Never heard back from the doctor so I said to myself forget it. Had other health issues cropping up that were more urgent.
Fast forward to last December at another check up my rheumatologist noticed how my ROM and pain had gotten worse so he referred me to an OS suspecting bursitis. Again had trouble with insurance, they weren’t accepting it even though they were still listed under in network. But the entire orthopedic department had merged with another one that didn’t accept this insurance.
I let it go for a bit since it was the end of the year anyway and a new deductible had to be met in the new year.
Finally in early April I called again and they now took my insurance. Went to see the OS and he thought it was a torn labrum since the x-ray looked “fine“ according to him and “I wouldn’t need a hip replacement or anything”. Sent me for a contrast MRI and that confirmed his suspicion. At the follow up he just burst in the room 45 minutes late and said he meant to contact me not to come in since it was a torn labrum that needed arthroscopic surgery and he doesn’t do that. He referred me to another doctor within his company who specializes in arthroscopic surgery.
When I saw that OS and relayed my experience he asked if that other doctor had looked at my MRI. I said, I did know, he didn’t show me anything, maybe he just read the radiologist summary. This new OS said it wasn’t as simple and that on top of the torn labrum I also had a bone cyst and also cartilage loss. A positive outcome of arthroscopic surgery was therefore not very likely. Taking into account my age he thought a THR would be a better way to go. Of course I was dumbfounded, this coming out of left field.
Seeing my hesitation he recommended getting a second opinion from another OS who does joint replacement. He felt the first surgeon might not wanted to consider it because of my age and he usually works on older patients.
So I started doing some research into the subject and also came across this forum. I found reassurance that this is definitely not something too unusual and the artificial joint could last a long time. I figured I’d rather have good life quality than bad quantity.
The new OS turned out to specialize in hip preservation and would also do joint replacement if warranted. He initially thought we could try for some preservation approach with arthroscopic surgery first and the viscosupplementation. He did sent me for a CAT scan with MAKO profile though to get some better idea of joint space. That CT revealed FAI and that was most likely the cause of the torn labrum.
He then decided that there were too many areas to fix arthroscopically and it wouldn’t buy me more than a couple of years and a THR would indeed be more beneficial.
So here I am 2 weeks post op. I was scheduled for same day surgery but initially didn’t pass PT eval because of dizziness and nausea. Ended up having to spent 2 nights because my bp started to plummet because of blood loss.
Recovery has been going ok, still dealing with low bp. Pain has been tolerable but I’ve been having quite a problem with muscle pain on the side and top of my thigh. Especially trying to sit putting weight on the thigh the muscles get compressed and it’s quite painful.
PT said he sees that quite often in younger, fitter patients as their muscles react stronger to trauma. Not sure if that is true or he’s just trying to make me feel bette, lol.
Anyway I guess time will tell. I was supposed to transition from walker to cane this week but with having that muscle pain he felt that was not stable enough so for now walking with one axle crutch instead.
I’m seeing my OS on Monday for the 2 week follow up. Let’s see what he says.