Our ability to walk upright plays a vital role in how we do everything during the day, and our pelvis and hips are a crucial part of how it all works. Known scientifically as the acetabulofemoral joint, your hip joint alone allows for a wide range of motion, making squatting, walking, jumping, and other movements requiring raising and lowering legs possible.
Keeping hips healthy makes a wide range of movements easier, but several problems, including injuries, illnesses, and other health problems, can damage them. Many treatments are available for hip problems, but at what point is hip replacement the solution? Let’s review common hip problems, nonsurgical options, and when surgery is the best choice.
Dr. David Dickerson and our dedicated staff at Performance Orthopaedics & Sports Medicine help the residents of Shrewsbury, Toms River, and Wall Township, New Jersey, with many joint problems, including conditions that affect the hips.
Whether through impact injury or overall wear and tear, your hips can be adversely affected by many problems, including:
Joint inflammation comes in many forms, and a few different forms of arthritis can damage joints over time, such as osteoarthritis (a wear-and-tear-related type), rheumatoid arthritis (synovial membrane irritation and cartilage damage), and traumatic arthritis (from injury).
Bursa exists in many joints to help cushion movement, and inflammation of it often causes pain and other symptoms due to friction. This also comes in different types: the trochanteric bursa affects the bursa on the side of the hip, separated from the actual joint, and the iliopsoas bursa, located in the upper buttock region.
Bone loss caused by a lack of blood, often resulting from bone injury or tumors.
Tearing or bruising in the connective muscles in the top of the ilium (the part of your pelvis that flares out). This frequently develops due to falls, impact injury, or quick twisting or turning of the hips.
Treating hip problems takes on many forms, depending on the severity of the condition and the safest method to manage it. Initial solutions for mild to moderate hip problems include things like:
Multiple treatments are often used at the same time to manage hip problems, and these are just some conservative ways to help.
When the other options aren’t enough to address hip pain and other symptoms, hip replacement surgery is the best choice. To know if this is what you need, look for symptoms like pain that limits movement, difficulty performing basic tasks, problems bending your hips, and persistent pain in the groin and the front of your thighs.
This surgery can also be done in multiple ways, such as the anterior approach done from the front of the upper thigh, the anterolateral approach done from the outside of the pelvis, and the transgluteal method done from the side. The posterior approach is the most common, which is done just behind the side of the hip bone.
Hip problems can be managed with several methods, but you should know what signs to look for that indicate hip replacement surgery may be the solution you need. To find out how to treat your hip issues, call 732-691-4898 or use online booking to make an appointment with Dr. Dickerson and the Performance Orthopaedic & Sports Medicine team today.
