Sara’s Hip Dysplasia Surgery Options
on Nov 04, 2011, Updated Jul 18, 2020
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On Tuesday, November 1, Sara had surgery at the University of Iowa to correct her dislocated left hip. Her surgeon, Dr. Weinstein, gave us four different scenarios that he said could happen to her during surgery:
1. Closed reduction – manually manipulate the femur back into the socket without cutting into her at all.
2. Adductor Tenotomy – small incision is made in in the groin to release the muscles that hold the femur in place so the femur can placed in the socket. This could also be used if the closed reduction was going well and the femur just needed a little more help being put in the socket.
3. Open Reduction – large, horizontal incision is made in the hip so the hip can be moved into the socket. May need blood transfusion because of blood loss during surgery.
4. Femoral Osteotomy – incision is made on the back of the thigh and the femur is cut and untwisted to help keep it in the socket. This is done as a last effort if other options aren’t successful.
We were told that because of her age, almost 18 months, and because she had a very high dislocation, the first two options would probably not be possible. However, she did have a very good range of motion and very loose hip, so we weren’t sure what would happen when she was under general anesthesia as it loosens everything up even more.
I’ll describe what happened to her in the next post!
She looks pretty happy considering!
I’m sure you have very limited time to be making posts, I can’t even imagine how busy you must be! But, I’m very excited to see how it all went! I’ve been stalking your blog waiting for an update. 🙂 Hope all is going better than you thought!