Mobilising post Total Hip Replacement

Sheelee

Hi Everyone,

Hope I find you all having a "better" day.

I'm still doing OK, but I am a bit confused about something. I'm doing the exercises to increase strength in the muscles around my groin/pelvic area, and am practising on my crutches as much as I can. However, I do find that fairly early on, I get an unpleasant achiness in my thigh. It's curtailing how much I can extend the number of steps I can do. Is this usual 🙄?

Any advice welcome.

Sheelee xx

RogerBill

Hi @Sheelee I think it's only about 10 days since your operation and, if so, my guess is that you might be overdoing things a little. So soon after the operation I found a little trial and error is required to find the optimum balance between doing enough to make progress and not so much as to set you back. Because a lot of muscles around the hip and down the thigh were disturbed during the operation some aches and pains are only to be expected. I expect you were discharged with a supply of pain killers which again I found some experimentation was required to get the optimum between taking none and up to the maximum prescribed. Also I had a few different physiotherapists, each had their own ideas so there's nothing wrong in varying the exercises especially as they keep telling you everyone is different.

I had a lot of bruising and swelling appear in my leg four days after the operation which only gradually disappeared. Apparently this is quite normal as the thigh is man-handled during the operation.

Sorry to ramble but if it's no more than "unpleasant" aches in your thigh my best guess would be that it's fairly normal at your early stage of recovery and there's nothing to worry about.

Sheelee

Hi RogerBill,

Sounds like me. I like to run before I can walk. But happily the pain continues to abate. The action of moving my leg in a straight position backwards is still quite stiff but I suppose that's specifically focusing on extending the new joint.

Funnily enough, on the advice of someone I had massage with (and still will once I'm further along the road to recovery) I took (and am still taking) a high dose arnica tablet. I had hardly any swelling and only the slightest signs of bruising. I had my clips out yesterday and the nurse commented on how well the wound was healing. (Another dressing on though, so still 2 days before shower day. Yipeeeeeeeee).

I am relieved to hear you say that you have to tweak the exercises to your needs, because I was finding some very painful to do, particularly in relation to getting on and off the bed. And some of the physios can be very prescriptive about what you must do.

Thanks for the advice RogerBill.

Sheelee xx

frogmorton

@Sheelee

You are doing so well! It's still very very early days for you :)

I wondered whether you are now able to use muscles which were hardly being used prior to your operation? and what Rogerbill said is spot on too a lot of your soft tissues were moved around for your surgery so understandable they are a bit sore.

Take it easy and take care too

Toni x

RogerBill

Glad to be of help @Sheelee and it's good to know your pain continues to abate.

"The action of moving my leg in a straight position backwards is still quite stiff but I suppose that's specifically focusing on extending the new joint."

Rather than extending the new joint think of it as the muscles having to stretch a little bit more because they've been rearranged during the op. I guess an elastic band stretched over a door hinge might be a good analogy. Also as Toni said, if in the months before your op you weren't able to do much walking or exercise the muscles now need to be gradually reawakened with gentle stretching and muscle building exercises. NB I'm not an expert instead I'm just talking from personal experience of a THR op.

Sheelee

Hi Everyone,

You're right. Before the op, rather than walk on my left leg, I threw it. No wonder my back got fed up and started protesting!

I also find placing my leg behind me feels stiff RogerBill, but I also find the muscles st the very top of the front of my leg near my groin hurt when I do some of the exercises. I've decided to build up slowly rather than push things.

Also still very tired a lot of the time. The back board in bed has been a godsend. Even though I'm tired, I am sleeping well.

Hope everyone is having a peaceful Easter,

Sheelee xx