Re: The dreaded possible infection--now I know just how you feel,

May 10, 2004

Dear , and all,

Well, after a long long wait, I finally managed to see my OS, Mr.

Skinner, today. For those of you who don’t know me, I had my op at the

end of Nov. 03 at the Royal National Orthopaedic Hospital in Stanmore

(London, England), and have been in the ‘turtles group’ for sometime. I

was a fairly straightforward candidate—some rotation of my hip, and OA,

but that is all. My op seemed to go well, the x-rays are good, but I

had a lot of swelling up to 3 months + , and a fair amount of pain,

which meant that my GP wouldn’t even let me drive until 3 months, as she

was afraid if I had to do an emergency stop, the pain would make me take

my foot off the pedal. I have improved slowly and now walk without

sticks around the house and work, but need a stick if going any

distance. Pain and clunking during the day is much much less and I can

even hike (slowly) with 2 sticks (I like using 2 sticks to hike) up to

an hour in the country. Haven’t been able to that for ages. And am

back to work full time, have scads of visitors, cook, go out a lot---in

fact, pretty well back to normal life. But I get a lot of night pain,

though this is variable.

My bloods for the past 3 months have showed raised levels of

inflammation, but no infection. Mr. Skinner thinks that I may well have

a low level infection. The next test is a needle into the hip capsule,

under a local anaesthetic, to take a sample of the hip fluid to test it

for infection. At this time they will give me an injection of something

(I forget what) to help with the pain. If there is infection, they will

try antibiotics, specific ones for this. If this does not work, then it

means a revision to a THR.

One gets out of the consultation and then thinks of other questions, of

course. Wished I had asked, what if there is not an infection and I

still have the pain, but didn’t. Also wished I asked why they have not

done this test sooner, and would that have made a difference anyway?

He did say that pain at night can indicate infection. He gave a good

reason for this, but of course, now that I come to repeat it, I am

having difficulty. (One should take a tape recorder to these

consultations.) Something about the hip having contact with the metal

during the day, but more with the fluid while one is sleeping. Or the

fluid is moving during the day, but not at night. Can’t really

remember, darn it. He also thinks my leg length difference of ½” is

about my not being able to completely weight bare properly on the

operated hip—not because there is a real difference. He cannot see a

difference or a reason for it in the x-rays. He did say that given my

level of determination, he thought I should be much better by now.

So—am feeling quite devastated by this all. One’s worst fears, and all

that, of course. I am about to become a first time granny any day now.

My daughter pointed out that if I do have to have another op, I’ll get

to be off work again and be able to spend lots of time with her and the

baby. There have to be better ways for this to happen, of course.

And, , would be interested if you had some of these same symptoms?

Thanks for listening,

Eleanor

Re: Re: where are " the others? "

Best of evrything as you go forward. Three years with your resurf is

not to

be disregarded. Do you know where you picked up the infection?

With Sincere wishes for a speedy recovery

Alyce

LC2K Wm Kennedy 5-23-03

May 10, 2004