HIp Resurfacing site/Surface Hippy, THE Alternative to Total Hip Replacement, Everything a patient wants to know.......that your doctor probably didn't tell you....

“ ...I was checking off my shopping list as I slowly pushed my grocery cart, slightly leaning against it, trying so hard to hide the limp that had now become so apparent. Suddenly I realized there was an item I had missed. Oh NO! It was two aisles over, an aisle that I already had walked past. I paused, leaning more against my cart, hoping to take some of the weight and pain away from my deteriorating left hip. I thought long and hard, do I really need that item? Can I do without it? Was it worth walking back TWO long painful aisles to get to that item? I decided no, it was not worth it, even though I really wanted that item, the cost of that item now equated to the amount of pain it would take to obtain it. The thought of that excruciating hip pain brought tears to my eyes, tears that I slowly and secretly wiped away... Vicky”

If the words above hit home, you have come to the right place. Welcome to the Surface Hippy Hip Resurfacing Site, an Alternative to Total Hip Replacement! We are Surface Hippies (Hip Resurfacing patients), we all share a common story. The above was mine, (meet Vicky Marlow , founder of this website). I went from a very active female in her 40's to being totally disabled, unable to walk without a cane. I am now pain free, after my Hip Resurfacing on December 1, 2005 (prior to FDA approval) under the skilled hands of the world renowned surgeon, Dr. Vijay Bose in India.

Welcome to your Surface Hippy/Hip Resurfacing site, the Alternative to Total Hip Replacement and your new family. Read this page carefully, and bookmark it, this site is filled with a ton of information that will be crucial through your journey to find answers.  It is updated with new info almost daily.  To meet fellow Surface Hippies (Hip Resurfacing patients), join the Surface Hippy Hip Resurfacing Message board & Survey Group

Also, for existing patients please take the survey/poll that I started on July 5, 2010, click on this link , then on the upper right you will see Join This Group!, click on that and sign up.  Then click on polls to participate in this survey.  I just started the site to keep this ongoing survey/poll on there and now it has turned into the fatest growing hip resurfacing support group and message board.  If anyone would like to post messages there, you are more than welcome to.  My other hip also started deteriorating last year and I had my right hip resurfaced just in December of 2010,  I have now joined the ranks of the bilaterals.   If you have had surgery already, please click on the link and participate in the survey and if you would like to just meet fellow Surface Hippies or soon to be Surface Hippies, join and feel free to post questions, information, or if you want to just give words of encouragement or need words of encouragement please join in the discussions.  We all need some support as we go through this and what better support than from someone that has been through it already.  There are many wonderful Surface Hippies/Hip Resurfacing patients out there, ready and willing to help you along your journey...

The Surface Hippy Hip Resurfacing Site Message board consists of Hip Resurfacing patients past and present all there to support each other from pre surgery to post op.

Also keep in mind that on the upper right side of every page there is a Search function, so if you want to search for a specific topic you can enter that there to find the articles related to it.  This site is growing all the time and the amount of information can be hard to sift through, or you can also This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it personally at anytime and ask and I can point you to where the information is.

Purpose of This Site

This Surface Hippy/Hip Resurfacing Site was created by a Surface Hippy (a fellow patient) and is here for the global community of Surface Hippies (Hip Resurfacing patients and those looking into hip surgery) or Alternatives to Total Hip Replacement to collect and share: a comprehensive knowledgebase on Hip Resurfacing; scientific and anecdotal statistics; and personal Hip Resurfacing stories to help people return to happy and productive lives, and to pay it forward   to future generations.  You will see many Hip Resurfacing patient videos throughout the Hip Stories section showing a full return to active lives including surfing, martial arts, tennis-handball-squash-racquetball, skiing, dancing, yoga, marathon and even Ironman and Ultraman triathlons.  You will also find over 20 video interviews with some of the world's top Orthpopedic surgeons so that you as a patient can conduct a virtual interview.

The re-emergence of Hip Resurfacing as a viable option worldwide is largely due to patient-driven demand.  Active patients that demand an Alternative option to a Total Hip Replacement. To ensure the long-term success of Hip Resurfacing, patients must educate and empower themselves to make the right decisions about the surgeons and procedures they choose.
 
Patients need to know what questions to ask to find the right surgeon for Hip Resurfacing, as well as to send a message to the doctors who aren’t current with the most successful techniques.
 
Complicated cases require the very best surgeons, and there is quite a range in skill and experience.  Surgeons that perform Total Hip Replacements do not always perform Hip Resurfacings, but all the surgeons that do Hip Resurfacing also do Total Hip Replacements.  You need the most accurate information you can get, because your quality of life depends on it.  And nobody cares about your quality of life as much as you do.  Find out if Hip Resurfacing, an alternative to Total Hip Replacement, is the right solution for you, as it is for many young - or young-at-heart patients. Welcome! 

Why Hip Resurfacing?

Hip Resurfacing is a bone preserving procedure that is a more conservative approach to hip surgery than the conventional Total Hip Replacement (THR). It gets rid of your hip pain but allows you to return to a full active lifestyle with no limitations.

As many medical sites will explain, (as this one does http://www.mcminncentre.co.uk/thr_today.htm#str ) one of the differences between Hip Resurfacing and a Total Hip Replacement is the amount of bone that is preserved or removed. With Hip Resurfacing your bone is preserved. Opposed to a Total Hip Replacement, where they place a stem down your thigh and you can lose approximately 30% - 45% of your proximal femur.  See Animations Videos here that show a Total Hip Replacement, a Hip Resurfacing and a Revision to Total Hip Replacement.

Short Video Showing the differences between Total Hip Replacement and Hip Resurfacing

Hip Resurfacing, Alternative to Total Hip Replacement

With Hip Resurfacing, they just shave off a little from the top of your femur and place a metal cap on it instead of cutting off the femoral head with a power saw the way they do with a Total Hip Replacement.  On the hip socket side or acetabulum, they place a metal cup which is the same for both Total Hip Replacement and Hip Resurfacing. Here is a link that shows the difference in loss of bone between a Total Hip Replacement and a Hip Resurfacing.

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Selecting The Right Surgeon For Hip Resurfacing

The first step in finding out if Hip Resurfacing is right for you or whether or not you qualify for Hip Resurfacing, is selecting the right surgeon.  Again, it is imperative you know that not all hip surgeons perform Hip Resurfacings.  In fact, most Orthopedic surgeons out there that do Total Hip Replacements (THR's) actually do not even do Hip Resurfacing, so they can not give you a true unbiased opinion.  But ALL Hip Resurfacing surgeons also perform Total Hip Replacements.  I believe the average number of hip surgeries an Orthopedic surgeon does in one year is only 20. Many of the surgeons that do Hip Resurfacing do at least 20 surgeries a month, some do 20 surgeries on a weekly basis, not just 20 in one whole year. They say practice makes perfect, you do not want to go to a surgeon that has to dust off the cob webs from his scalpel.  Another fact is that the majority of top hip resurfacing surgeons have done more Total Hip Replacements than Hip Resurfacings because THR's have been around longer and still not everyone is a candidate for Hip Resurfacing.  They are the true pros at hip surgery because they do a lot of them and they do them on a regular basis and they are cutting edge with the latest advancements. 

The only way you will get an un-biased valid opinion on whether or not you are a candidate for Hip Resurfacing, is if you get opinions from some of the top Hip Resurfacing surgeons in the world, ones that perform both procedures and can really tell you what the best option is for you. If you find yourself being told by your surgeon that you do not qualify for Hip Resurfacing, do NOT give up, or even if several surgeons tell you that a THR is the only way to go, first ask them how many hip resurfacings they themselves have done, more than likely it will be less than 100 or none at all.  Then contact me, I can help you get opinions for free from some of the very best in the world.  Once you find out if you are a candidate, then you can begin the process of deciding which surgeon to go to for your Hip Resurfacing and start your journey back to enjoying all the activities you ever dreamed of.  Do not give up and do not buy into all of the hype about metal on metal implants.  Read this section and watch the video interviews with six of the world's top Orthopedic surgeon's that all address the recent press Addressing the Concerns about Metal on Metal implants .  Between these six top surgeons, they have performed over 27,000 total hip surgeries and over 13,000 Hip Resurfacings.

Selecting the right surgeon is crucial to getting long term positive results after any hip surgery but especially for Hip Resurfacing.  It is a personal decision but one that must be taken very seriously.  Basically, if you choose the wrong surgeon and the surgery does not go as planned, you can not get a “do over” without risking a revision surgery to a THR (Total Hip Replacement), which in turn means another major surgery.

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To begin your journey to finding out if Hip Resurfacing is right for you Start Here

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