A Little History

by Pamela Maunsell
(London, England)

Hi

I’m Pamela and I’m the owner and general gofer of this site - Hip Replacement and Recovery- but I’m a hip replacement patient too.

A little history

In December 2007 I started to have pains in my right hip. Despite all my denials my doctor insisted that I’d not only had a fall and but that I’d forgotten all about it and that he suspected a broken hip (and I assume dementia but he didn’t mention that!). Very strange but there was no arguing with him so it was off for X-rays.

No break.

I was then sent to the triage physiotherapist who gave a provisional diagnosis of a trochanteric bursitis and a labral tear and referred me to the surgeon. If you’d asked me I would have said the pain was due to my poor posture which in turn was caused by a serious accident I had in 2005 in which I shattered my left lower leg.

We were all wrong. The registrar took one look at my x-rays and said “Forget all that what about the severe arthritis you have in both hips. You’re going to need replacements.” That was a total shock.

And so it was in October 2009 I was wheeled into the operating theatre and a new right hip put in. At my six monthly review (about a week ago from the time of writing this) the registrar said that my x-rays showed a perfect hip replacement that could be held up as the gold standard to which others could be compared – fabulous! The only problem is that he thinks it might be infected.

As I’d been having pain in my left knee (the one involved in the aforementioned climbing accident) my doctor had asked him to have a look at that too. He only needed to look at the x-ray for about once second before pronouncing “You need a total knee replacement”. They don’t mince their words do they?

Did I also forget to mention my left hip has started hurting? Ho hum. It was always simply a matter of time when it would be done but I think it must be getting fed up with the knee trying to push in line.

What next? Well I guess I wait to see if the right hip is infected and then decide if I need the left knee/hip done now. I’ve got my appointment on Friday – so finger’s crossed and I’ll let you know what happens.

I’m feeling rather scared 