Hip pain is a common occurrence, and treatments for mild cases can be as simple as resting your joints and avoiding physical activities. However, if your aches do not subside despite adequate rest, you might want to get your hips checked. Muscle injury and joint damage are common causes of hip pain. Seeking professional medical help from an orthopedic doctor may be the best thing to do. But how do orthopedic doctors alleviate your hip pain?
What Are Orthopedic Doctors?
Orthopedic doctors specialize in diagnosing and treating problems involving your joints, muscles, ligaments, and other connective tissues. Injury and degeneration caused by repetitive motion in your shoulders, hips, knees, and ankles are the common causes of such conditions.
Treatments include non-surgical and surgical interventions. Not all orthopedic doctors, however, are trained to perform surgery, but they may specialize in certain body parts or sports medicine. Orthopedic surgeons, on the other hand, can treat you using noninvasive and invasive methods.
Hip Pain Diagnosis and Treatment
Your orthopedic doctor can help you with hip pain. Before treatment, your orthopedic doctor will diagnose your condition through a physical exam and diagnostic or lab tests. When they confirm your diagnosis, your provider will explain your symptoms and the causes of your condition or injury. This information will help you both in setting goals for your recovery.
The location of the pain can help your doctor identify its cause. Upper thigh and outer hip and buttock pain are typically due to problems with the soft tissues around your hip. Chronic back pain can also progress and affect your hips.
However, if the pain is within the inner hip area, you may have joint problems. Diseases like arthritis and bursitis can damage your hip joints. Arthritis is a group of conditions characterized by joint inflammation. On the other hand, bursitis occurs when the bursae, fluid-filled sacs that protect your joints, are inflamed.
Other causes of joint-related pain include injuries such as fractures, dislocations, and hernias, or conditions like osteoporosis, which can be diagnosed through a bone density scan.
Medication and Injections
Your doctor will first recommend nonsurgical treatments to control your pain and other symptoms. Aside from advising you to rest, they can prescribe medications. Depending on your specific condition, you may have to take any of the following medications:
- Nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs
- Muscle relaxants
- Tricyclic antidepressants
- Serotonin and norepinephrine reuptake inhibitors
It is vital that you inform your doctor about your other medications and to take them as prescribed to avoid any adverse side effects.
They can also recommend viscosupplementation, a treatment method often used for arthritis patients. It involves the injection of hyaluronic acid in the affected joint. Hyaluronic acid can give you 6 months of pain relief and improve your mobility.
Therapy and Rehabilitation
Orthopedic doctors can also work with experienced physical therapists to create a therapy program that can help alleviate your hip pain and set you on the road to recovery. Occupational therapists can also teach you how you can move your body efficiently. Changing the way you move will help ease the pain and reduce pressure on your hips while allowing you to continue moving.
Physical therapy can significantly speed up your recovery and help you regain strength, coordination, and flexibility. Depending on your condition, routines may be challenging at first. Nonetheless, with the guidance of your medical providers, you will see significant progress. Underutilization of your joints may worsen your condition.
Surgery
Your orthopedist will not only provide you with treatment options but will also track your healing progress. Throughout your treatment, they can suggest modifications to your treatment plan as you improve.
If your ongoing treatments result in less progress than expected, your orthopedist may suggest surgical intervention, such as joint replacement or hip arthroscopy. Surgery to replace the hip joint used to be performed with an open procedure. However, minimally invasive joint replacement surgery is now possible.
Meanwhile, hip arthroscopy can both aid in the diagnosis and treatment of hip problems because it allows your doctor to look inside your joint.
Orthopedic Doctor in Merriam, KS
Orthopedic doctors are equipped with knowledge and skills to address your hip pain. If you are experiencing hip pain that is not resolved with rest and over-the-counter medications, don’t hesitate to seek medical help.
Here at Midwest Orthopaedics, we offer you quality orthopedic care for hip pain through nonsurgical and surgical treatments. We assure you that our board-certified providers will give you and your family the patient-centered care you deserve.
For questions and concerns, call us at (913) 362-8317. You can also request an appointment with us through our secure online form. We look forward to helping you relieve your pain!
