A Patient's Guide to Knee and Hip Replacement: Everything You Need to Know [Paperback]

Describes the procedures of knee and hip surgery, looks at alternatives and discusses symptoms, treatments, long-term prognosis, and costs.

Knee and Hip Replacements
In 1998, more than 300,000 people in the U.S. had either a knee or hip replacement. That number is growing each year. As a result of this relatively new medical technology, many people who thought they were fated to spend the rest of their days in a wheelchair or walking in pain -- and even then only with the help of a cane or walker -- have resumed normal lives. I am one of those people. It all started ten years ago, when I was 63 and experiencing growing discomfort in my right knee. At first, when my family doctor told me I had arthritis, I just shrugged it off. After all, as we grow older, doesn't everyone have a "touch of arthritis?" (More specifically, I had osteoarthritis, the most common form of the disease called arthritis. "Every person over 60 could be found to have it to some degree," says Dr. William Reynolds, Director of Medical and Scientific Affairs for the U.S. Arthritis Foundation. Fortunately, he adds, "only a small percentage of those with osteoarthritis have it badly enough to notice it." Unfortunately, mine was the noticeable kind. Attempts to treat the disease with diet changes, exercise, homeopathic remedies and cortisone didn't help. And so, as my condition worsened, my activity was severely curtailed. Tennis, my favorite sport, was out of the question. Any weight-bearing acti vity, including walking, was extremely painful. Driving was getting more and more difficult. My contributions to my family's daily living needs became memories. Increasingly I found myself sitting in my recliner avoiding the moment of ambulation. (The inanity of most television programming turned out to be my friend. Without it I might be sitting in that chair still.) Nature's calls were a constant source of trepidation until a friend suggested I get a raised toilet seat. But while that somewhat solved the physical problem, it was an ongoing reminder that I faced a future laced with increasing indignities. Living on a steady diet of powerful pain-killers -- which provided only partial and temporary relief -- I had dismal visions of myself housebound, if not wheelchair-bound, for the rest of my life. Eventually, I became convinced that my only alternative was a total knee replacement even though at that time I had only the vaguest notion of what a total knee replacement was. I was soon to learn, however, that total joint replacement is the most revolutionary new development of the past hundred years for the treatment of the most severe cases of arthritis. I was also to learn that the replacement of crippled and diseased joints -- most particularly hips and knees -- with artificial prostheses has already enabled millions of people to regain a quality of life they thought had been lost forever. As it turned out, however, one knee replacement was not enough. Within months I also had my other knee and my left hip surgically replaced. All three surgeries were performed by Dr. Eugene Wolf at the California-Pacific Medical Center in San Francisco. (Dr. Wolf subsequently wrote the foreword and supplied the key medical information for "A Patient's Guide to Knee and Hip Replacement.") Today, at age 73, I lead a relatively normal life. I do not use a cane or a walker. I drive without difficulty, can walk several miles at a stretch, ride my bike and, much to everyone's surprise, including my own, I am playing tennis again -- mostly doubles but even an occasional set of singles. (And the raised toilet seat is on a shelf in my closet.) Because my experience is not unique -- today knee and hip replacements are upwards of 95% successful -- I decided to write a book enabling those facing such a possibility know what they're in for. This is that book. "A Patient's Guide to Knee and Hip Replacement" covers such topics as if and when you should seriously consider a joint replacement; what to expect in the pre-op period, what the surgeon actually does in the operating room, the recovery process, managing with your new knee or hip, the role and different stages of physical therapy, and what the patient can reasonably expect in the long term. Hopefully, by enabling you to share this experience, "A Patient's Guide to Knee and Hip Replacement" will demystify the entire process and not only help you get through your surgery -- if that's the course you opt for -- but to get the best possible results from it.