HIP PAIN

Reducing pain through nonsurgical treatments

Relief of hip joint pain

The hip joint is the largest joint in the human body has the weight-bearing job of standing, walking and running. In cases of degenerative arthritis, the cartilage of the hip joint can deteriorate and become inflamed.

Patients with hip joint pain complain of increased pain with weight-bearing and any kind of hip movement. For those with hip joint pain, simply getting out of a car or climbing stairs can be excruciating.

While artificial hip joint replacement can successfully eliminate hip pain from arthritis and other degenerative conditions, not everyone is appropriate for artificial hip joint replacement. That’s because an orthopedic surgeon may be concerned about the patient outliving the lifespan of the artificial joint, which may last 15 to 20 years. Implanting an artificial hip into a 40 year old patient may mean that patient has to undergo a second major reconstruction surgery at age 60 to replace the worn out artificial joint.

Consequently, a pain management physician may try to provide relief from some hip pain symptoms to delay hip replacement until the patient is older. Other problems may also not be appropriate for hip replacement. In that sense, the pain management physician plays a key role in helping a person manage their hip pain.

The pain management specialist during a visit can often reproduce the pain with internal and external rotation of the hip to determine the source of the pain. As with spinal injections, or knee injections, the goal of a hip joint pain treatment is to avoid oral medications that can affect internal organs and address the pain generator in the hip area directly.

Accordingly, a steroid injection can relieve hip joint pain, as well as confirm the diagnosis of the source of pain. If the injection at a certain location proves effective, it then confirms to the pain management specialist the location of the pain generator.

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Dr. Robert Hannahan is a board-certified anesthesiologist who has specialized in pain management for over 30 years in the Northwest Florida and South Alabama region. He has pain management offices across the Gulf Coast of Florida, including Panama City, FL; Port St. Joe, FL; Enterprise, Alabama; and Dothan, Alabama. Dr. Hannahan is referred pain patients that suffer from back pain, neck pain, knee pain, hip pain, cancer pain and diabetic neuropathy.

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