Excruciating pain leads to double hip replacement for young mom
For years Morgan Phillips and her doctors assumed strained muscles and ligaments surrounding her hip joint caused her chronic hip pain.
A soccer and field hockey player, she tried massages and physical therapy, but her hip pain that started in high school never went away. The Chesapeake native continued to play soccer into her 30s despite the discomfort.
"The pain never really went away," says Morgan, 35, a project manager for a nationwide payroll and human resources company. "I just began to tolerate and figure this is how things would be."
Pregnancy and hip pain
Morgan's hips became excruciatingly painful during her pregnancy. With her tiny frame, Morgan and her doctor chalked it up to pregnancy issues and the baby's weight.
"The pain didn't go away even after I had my daughter," notes Morgan, who, with her husband, John, became increasingly concerned. "By the time Ava was six months old, everything was so difficult, I knew I had to see an orthopedist."
Neighbors in Virginia Beach recommended Sentara orthopedic surgeon Dr. Joseph Gondusky. X-rays showed that Morgan had a collapsed femoral head on her right hip.
This condition, called osteonecrosis, occurs when the blood supply to the head of the femur is disrupted. The top of the femur makes up the "ball" of the ball and socket hip joint. Because bone cells need a steady supply of blood to stay healthy, osteonecrosis can ultimately lead to the destruction of the hip joint and severe arthritis, according to the American Academy of Orthopaedic Surgeons (AAOS).
"Getting the news that I would need a hip replacement at such a young age took me a good week to process," Morgan recalls. "It was mentally challenging thinking that this is how the rest of my life will be, and they said it was just a matter of time before the other hip bone collapsed."
The average age for hip replacement surgery is 65 years, according to an AAOS study. However, younger patients are becoming more interested in joint replacement surgery due to less invasive procedures and surgical advances that allow for quicker recoveries.
Surgery, recovery and another surgery
Dr. Gondusky performed Morgan's first hip replacement surgery at Sentara Leigh Hospital. He used the anterior approach, which means the surgeon reaches the hip joint from the front rather than the side or back of the thigh. With this approach, surgeons avoid cutting through muscles, speeding up patients' recoveries.
An orthopedic surgeon replaces the damaged ball-and-socket joint with a metal ball-and-socket during hip replacement surgery. A plastic or ceramic spacer inserted between the new ball and the socket creates a smoother gliding surface.
Morgan was out of bed a few hours after surgery, walking down the hall with a therapist.
"I dropped off my daughter at daycare in the morning with my husband, had surgery, and we were able to pick up my daughter in time for dinner," Morgan says.
Her recovery advice? Listen to your body and keep up with physical therapy.
"I tried different ways to exercise but walking was the number one activity that helped with my recovery," Morgan explains. "I got up every 30 or 40 minutes. Movement was the key."
Second surgery needed
A few months after her first surgery, Morgan could feel her left hip giving away. So again, in excruciating pain, she visited Dr. Gondusky, and they planned her second hip replacement.
Morgan underwent the same procedure at Sentara Leigh. Her recovery went even faster this time because she had a healthy, healed right hip to lean on.
Like many other patients, Morgan suffered in silence for a long time before her pain became unbearable. She wishes she had looked for answers sooner.
"This surgery has given my life back to me," she emphasizes. "I can go on long walks, pick up my daughter without cringing and even get out of bed without pain. Before this, I could never get comfortable. These surgeries have improved every aspect of my life. I feel like a teenager again."