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Total Hip Replacement Archives | Orthoped

Nutrition and Joint Care

Nutrition

    • Glucosamine and Chondroitin
      Although the book title is a bit of a misnomer, The Arthritis Cure details the importance of glucosamine and chondroitin to the health of cartilage. Glucosamine can be purchased over-the-counter at health food stores, pharmacies, and discount stores as glucosamine sulfate or glucosamine HCl, often in combination with chondroitin sulfate. The labelling often recommends an initial dose of 1500 mg of glucosamine sulfate and 1200 mg of chondroitin sulfate for 60 days, then a maintenance dose of 500 mg of each daily following that.Some have argued that chondrotin is a very large molecule and may be difficult to be absorbed into the bloodstream. Because glocusamine is a sugar, some have suggested large doses may increase your risk of developing diabetes. Also, if your cartilage is severly damaged, added nutrients may be akin to throwing fertilizer on the sidewalk and expecting grass to grow.

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Minimally Invasive Total Hip Replacement

Minimally Invasive or Mini-incision Hip Replacement

There are several varieties of “minimally invasive” or “mini-incision” hip replacements being done. Some are the same as the normal operation, just through the use of specialized instruments the OS is able to work using a smaller incision, some do the normal procedure with an incision as small as 5 inches long. Another other type is done with instruments marketed by Zimmer Orthopedics, Inc. This involves two two-inch incisions and the procedure is done using flouroscopy. In this procedure the femoral head is broken into several peices so it can be removed through the smaller opening. (more…)

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Hip Resurfacing Frequently Asked Questions

What are the major differences among the hip resurfacing implants?

The primary difference lies in the backing of the acetabular component. The BHR (Midland Medical Technology) uses a cast porous surface with a hydroaxiphate (HA) coating to promote bone ingrowth. The Wright Conserve Plus using a sintering process to affix cobalt chrome beads to the back surface. The Corin Cormet device has a plasma sprayed titanium backing with an HA coating. MidMedtech asserts that the heating of the device in the sintering or plasma spray process weakens the metal integrity. It has been shown in laboratory tests however, that when the machining tolerances are identical, the wear rate is not affected by the heat treatment. (more…)

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Osteotomy for Hip Dysplasia

Hip Dysplasia

Hip dysplasia is a condition where the hip socket is not deep enough to allow proper function of the hip joint. It is sometimes referred to as developmental dysplasia of the hip (DDH) or congenital dysplasia of the hip (CDH). Often it appears bilaterally. In the worst cases the hip may be dislocated from the socket. Dysplasia is often diagnosed when a child has difficulty walking or is very slow to begin walking. In less severe forms the condition can go undiagnosed until adulthood, when the patient begins to have pain and show signs of early osteoarthritis due to the poor mechanics of the joint. (more…)

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Post Surgical Care

Home Preparation Items

Check with your doctor and hospital about what you will need. Generally you will be provided with the following equipment or need to obtain them from a home health equipment store. In most cases these devices will be needed for the first six weeks to help avoid the risk of dislocation before the hip capsule heals. Some of these devices may be helpful before surgery to make life less painful. I bought a reacher about a year before surgery and it helped a lot. (more…)

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Surgical Issues

Choosing a Doctor

The best indicators of success of a surgeon is the number of surgeries performed per year, experience with the tools and device, and the number of hip replacement surgeries per year for the hospital. If a doctor is doing 50 hip replacements or resurfacings per year, he or she is doing at least one per week and is more likely to have experience with a wide variety of patients and surgical challenges and is more likely to be on top of the latest techniques and hardware than a surgeon doing fewer. (more…)

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Cancer risks among total hip patients

“I am about to have a total hip in May. The thought of it is exhausting as I am only 30 years old. A big piece of metal would stay inside my body for many years! How will my body react to it? Perhaps, frightful thought, I may develop cancer around it?….”

Alloys used for manufacture of total hip prostheses contain materials which are potentially carcinogenic (can produce cancer) in animals.
It is also known that levels of some metals (Chromium, Nickel, e.g) are elevated both in the tissues around the total hip joint and in the blood of patients with total hips.
Also bone cement contains materials with potential carcinogenic effect that may enter into the circulation. (more…)

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Identification of bacteria

How do the bacteriologists decide which bacteria is causing the postoperative wound infection?

In about 130 years the bacteriologists used the relatively simple method to smear the pus or the swabs from the wound on to special substrate. The substrate is either fast, gelatin-like substance agar mixed with blood; or liquid, a kind of nutritious soup in a bottle.

Pus containing Staphylococcus aureus bacteria was smeared on the surface of the blood-agar plate. The blood-agar plate is within a glass dish and is covered by another dish to prevent downfall of other bacteria from the air. The whole culture is grown for at least 2 days in a constant temperature (32-37 degrees Celsius). (more…)

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Women and Total Hip Replacement

Pregnancy and total hip replacement. What about sex after THR? Osteoporosis after menopause.
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Expectations and satisfaction from total hip surgery

Contents:

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