Research presented last month at the annual meeting of the American Orthopaedic Society for Sports Medicine in Baltimore provides more evidence that there’s (an active) life after hip surgery. And that includes the more complicated procedures.
The study, by Dr. Marc Philippon, a pioneer in arthroscopic hip surgery who trained my own surgeon in the procedure, found that an overwhelming majority of elite athletes suffering from hip labrum tears returned to their sports after an arthroscopic technique using an “ipsilateral iliotibial band autograph.”
I didn’t have to undergo such a procedure, fortunately. My labrum tears in both hip joints only required stitching with “anchors.” The procedure in Dr. Philippon’s study is for those with severe labrum damage, and it involves using a graft of tissue harvested from the iliotibial band, or ITB. The graft is sutured to the labral remnant, re-establishing a seal of the hip joint.You can read more about this complex procedure here.
So Dr. Philippon and his team at the Steadman Philippon Research Institute in Vail, Colo., followed 17 of the 21 professional athletes who had undergone this procedure for almost three years and received physical therapy. Each had an average age of 28. The athletes participated in soccer, hockey, football, skiing, baseball, basketball and ice skating. During this time all but two had improved clinical outcomes on various mobility indexes.
Hello, and thanks for writing.
I am sorry about your injury. I feel your pain! Really. The same thing happened to me while training for the New York marathon in 2010. (It would’ve been my 10th.) I saw a sports doctor when the pain got really bad; he thought I had a bad case of tendonitis and suggested that I run the race anyway. I really wanted to. But the trouble was, I couldn’t do any more than 10 miles without experiencing excruciating pain in the hip joint and groin.
Some people do manage to run successfully (even marathons) with labral tears, provided they can manage the pain. I know of people who have done this via PT, cortisone shots and/or PRP injections.
Good luck to you in whatever you decide, and let us know how you are doing.
Im in a dilema as to what to do. In 2010 I was training for first marathon..(the Houston) Got to Dec. in training and 18 miler and the pain was awful..FAI and labral tear..surgery in Aug. 2011..anchors put in yadayadayada. FF March 2012 doing zumba and felt pop and pain..PT started backsliding..cortisone injection did nothing, got injection into joint, seems to have helped somewhat. MRI done and shows signs of retaer, says to go back in he would cut and not anchor again..had 3 put in last time. I really want to do marathon before surgery. I feel like if I have surgery done I may not be able to do a marathon..thoughts on running with labral tear knowing when you have surgery it will be cut out and not repaired?
Well that is encouraging! Glad to hear you are doing so well! Thanks for keeping the blog going.
Jenna
Hi Jenna,
Nice hearing from you. You were so right about the benefits of active release technique! Just finished a couple of months of PT on my right knee with an ART-trained therapist. Hurt like heck, but so beneficial.
Hope you are doing well.
Vivian