This is an infomercial for you young guys to remember when your hips decide to quit on you.
Well, it started about 2 years ago on an extended trip at Powder Mountain, Snowbird and Alta. Several days of hard skiing and moderate hiking after which the hips were screaming. I've got about 40 years of skiing on them, with many other things that beat you up. Yep, I'm one of the old farts here.
My initial ortho x-rays and says you need a hip replacement. What about skiing? You're done. Not what I wanted to hear.
Fellow on patrol with me sells ortho implants. I ask him and he refers me to another ortho who skis. He knows the drill, impact of skiing on the hips, snowplows for sleds, etc. Tells me not to do a total hip, but a procedure called resurfacing. Says he can't do them right now because the FDA has recalled his implant. Shit.
Three sets of steroid injections later, I'm looking for a solution. I'm to the point that while skiing isn't any more painful than walking, but I've started to lose muscle strength because of the lack of use due to chronic pain. As such, skiing is tentative at best.
I start poking around on the interweb a few weeks ago to see if the devices have been re-approved by the FDA, and found a doc in Columbia, SC who specializes in hip resurfacing. Basically, they trim the femoral head and recover it, and do a floating socket in the hip that the bone weaves into. Unlike a total hip where they whack off the femoral head. He uses a different implant that was not recalled.
Dr. Thomas Gross. http://grossortho.com/
Has done more than anyone in the U.S. 4,300 so far.
Assuming I can get insurance squared away, looks like surgery sometime this spring. I'm leaning to the process of doing one side on Monday, next side on Wednesday and out of the hospital on Thursday or Friday. Six weeks of no driving, six month recovery. Self imposed physical therapy. Says I will be walking a mile a day in six weeks.
He asked what my long-term goal was following surgery, to which I replied skiing next December. His website shows a bunch of folks who have resumed skiing after the surgery.
I have found three folks locally who have used him for the procedure. One had it done in 2000 and 2002, is an avid outdoorsman and hiker, says it was a lifesaver. Fellow that is 18 months post surgery, 64 years old and a professional tree trimmer. Got him back in the game using climbing spikes. Wife's cousin's husband who is a veterinarian and says it is great.
Biggest concern is the metal on metal fatigue and metal leaching. Gross says if he sizes the replacement appropriately and get the alignment of the implant correct, no problems. Annual blood tests to check. The three folks that used him have had zero issues.
Waiting on a surgery date, bone density scan, and insurance bullshit.
Fingers crossed.
Ken
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