Hip Care

Wisconsin Bone & Joint hip care experts offer comprehensive
services to individuals with a wide range of hip pain issues.

Posterior Total Hip Replacement

Hip Specialists At Wisconsin Bone & Joint

The physicians at Wisconsin Bone & Joint utilize cutting-edge technology to assess, diagnose and work with patients to develop innovative treatment plans for a variety of hip conditions and injuries. Our team of physicians are committed to providing you with the best treatment options to alleviate your hip pain.

Providing trusted Orthopedic care in the community for over 40+ years

At Wisconsin Bone and Joint, we pride ourselves with providing you highly personalized and comprehensive orthopedic care. Our philosophy of direct physician-to-patient care means your physician will be an intrical part of every stage of your care. This commitment to a dedicated continuum-of-care model has made us one of the most trusted and respected practices in Southeast Wisconsin and greater Milwaukee area.

Posterior Total Hip Replacement

What Are Posterior Total Hip Replacement?

You Don’t Have to Live with Joint Pain

Your hip joints are involved in almost every activity you do. Simple movements such as walking, bending, and turning require the use of your hip and knee joints.

Normally, all parts of these joints work together and the joint moves easily without pain. But when the joint becomes diseased or injured, the resulting pain can severely limit your ability to move and work. Osteoarthritis, one of the most common forms of degenerative joint disease, affects an estimated 43 million people in the United States.

Whether you are considering a total joint replacement, or are just beginning to explore available treatments, this website is for you. It will help you understand the causes of joint pain and treatment options. Most importantly, it will give you hope that you may be able to return to your favorite activities.

What is a Hip Joint?

Your hip joint is a ball-and-socket joint, formed by the ball, or femoral head, at the upper end of the thighbone, and the rounded socket, or acetabulum, in the pelvis. The bone ends of a joint are covered with a smooth, tough material called cartilage.

Normal cartilage cushions the bones and allows nearly frictionless and pain-free movement. The rest of the surfaces of the joint are covered by a thin, smooth tissue lining called the synovium. The synovium produces fluid that acts as a lubricant to reduce friction and wear in the joint.

What Causes Posterior Total Hip Replacement?

Osteoarthritis (OA)

Sometimes called degenerative arthritis because it is a “wearing out” condition involving the breakdown of cartilage and bones. When cartilage wears away, the bones rub against each other, causing pain and stiffness. OA usually occurs in people aged 50 years and older, and frequently in individuals with a family history of arthritis.

Rheumatoid Arthritis (RA)

Causes the synovium to become thickened and inflamed. In turn, too much synovial fluid is produced within the joint space, which causes a chronic inflammation that damages the cartilage.
This results in cartilage loss, pain, and stiffness. RA affects women about 3 times more often than men, and may affect other organs of the body.

Post-traumatic Arthritis

May develop after an injury to the joint in which the bone and cartilage do not heal properly. The joint is no longer smooth and these irregularities lead to more wear on the joint.

Avascular Necrosis

Can result when bone is deprived of its normal blood supply. Without proper nutrition from the blood, the bone’s structure weakens and may collapse and damage the cartilage.

Paget’s Disease

A bone disease that often affects the hip. Bone formation is sped up, causing the density and shape of the bone to change. Joint pain can also be caused by deformity or direct injury to the joint. In some cases, joint pain is made worse by the fact that a person will avoid using a painful joint, weakening the muscles and making the joint even more difficult to move.

What Are The Treatment Options Posterior Total Hip Replacement?

Following the orthopaedic evaluation, your orthopaedic surgeon will review and discuss the results with you. Based on his or her diagnosis, your treatment options may include:

  • Medication
  • Joint fluid supplements
  • Physical therapy
  • Joint replacement

Total Hip Replacement

Hip replacement is one of the most important surgical advances of this century. This surgery helps more than 300,000 Americans each year to relieve their pain, and get back to enjoying normal, everyday activities. Hip replacement involves the removal of arthritic bone ends and damaged cartilage and replacing them with prosthetic implants that replicate the hip joint.

Hip replacement surgery may be considered when arthritis limits your everyday activities such as walking and bending, when pain continues while resting, or stiffness in your hip limits your ability to move or lift your leg.

Hip replacement may be recommended only after careful diagnosis of your joint problem. It is time to consider surgery if you have little pain relief from anti-inflammatory drugs or other treatments, such as physical therapy, do not relieve hip pain.

Hip replacement can help relieve pain and get you back to enjoying normal, everyday activities.

Total hip replacement is often reserved for patients who:

  • Have a painful, disabling joint disease of the hip resulting from a severe form of arthritis
  • Are not likely to achieve satisfactory results from less invasive procedures, such as arthrodesis (artificial stiffening or fixation of the joint)
  • Have bone stock that is of poor quality or inadequate for other reconstructive techniques

In a total hip replacement operation, the Wisconsin Bone & Joint surgeon replaces the worn surfaces of the hip joint with an artificial hip joint. The worn head of the femur (thigh bone) is replaced with a metal or ceramic ball mounted on a stem; the stem is placed firmly into the canal of the thigh bone at its upper end. The acetabulum (hip socket) is prepared and implanted with a metal cup and plastic or ceramic insert. The ball and insert glide together to replicate the hip joint.

Our team is here for you

When conservative care and treatment is appropriate, we offer the best, least invasive, least aggressive treatment options to relieve your pain and discomfort. When an injury is more serious and conservative care is not an option, our orthopedic surgeons provide the latest in innovative surgical interventions available with the goal of getting you back to the life you love. Wisconsin Bone & Joint physicians offer orthopedic services at three convenient locations in Mayfair, Glendale and Cedarburg.