New in here - double hip replacement

Purplelady

After many years (over 20) of visiting my GP with hip problems, mainly no flexibility and aches, I saw a physiotherapist in January who could not believe I had never had an x-Ray. I was always told it was definitely not arthritis.

I had an X-ray in February and I do have arthritis in both hips and pelvis.

I had a phone call last week to offer me an appointment at our local hospital the following day.

I require to have both hips replaced, potentially at the same time, as my pelvis is tilted meaning if they did one it could pop out!!!! All this will be passed in to the consultant. The wait is about a year.

I feel sick at having one done but having two done at the same time sounds terrifying :(

Has anyone had this done that can give me some feedback.

Thank you

Ellen

Hello @Purplelady welcome to the online community.

I can see you are feeling quite shocked and sick at the thought of having both hips replaced at the same time.

Other people have had this done although I am not sure how recently. @stickywicket had a double hip replacement pre joining the forum if I remember rightly.

The good thing is you have a while to prepare for your procedure. For instance you can chat to everyone who has had their hip/s done forewarned is forearmed after all.

This thread by

https://community.versusarthritis.org/discussion/55224/hip-replacement-tips

@RogerBill is definitely worth a read.

This is a very old, but still useful thread about preparing for hospital/surgery:

https://community.versusarthritis.org/discussion/18036/going-to-hospital-great-tips

I'll leave you now to meet some of our members.

Please do keep posting if you can I for one would be very interested in your progress.

Best wishes

Ellen.

pmas

@Purplelady I had both hips replaced but not at the same time. Although they were both in the same state of collapse the consultant was unwilling to replace both at the same time due to possible complications. I had my right hip replaced in Feb 22 and the left hip in April 22 - eleven weeks apart.

After the first op I was unable to do any physio, so still had to use a walker and wheelchair as I couldn’t weightbear on the unoperated hip. Once the second op was completed, I started physio immediately. Due to muscle wastage, it took some time to build up range of movement and strength, but you get there in the end!

Both ops were done using spinal anaesthesia and sedation. I was worried about the spinal as I have arthritis in lower spine, but it was fine. The sedation knocked me out for the first op, but I was awake and talking to the anaesthetist a few times during the second op!

When you have no choice but surgery you have to trust the surgeon and his team - they absolutely know what they’re doing. We have an amazing NHS! Good luck with your ops and new hips x

Nurina

Hi @Purplelady I've search posts here with simultaneous double hip replacement and I've found yours. I can't find information about this procedure because usually is one hip after the other. I'd like to know how you feel about that. My consultant said my both hips are a total mess and it's better to have both done at the same time because the recovery is almost the same and both legs will recover at the same time. He said I don't have a good leg to support the other during rehabilitation.

Take care x