When Your Hips Hurt…

Is one hip hurting? Or both? Hip pain, a common complaint we see with patients, generally originates in three areas near and around the hip joint itself. Once we establish the source of the discomfort, we can work towards hip pain relief. 

  1. Pain in the ball and socket joint is called Intra-articular pain.  
  2. Pain near, but outside the ball and socket joint is called extra-articular 
  3. Pain that seems like it comes from hip but actually comes from another area of the body, like the lower back, is called referred pain.

Common Causes of Intra-articular Hip Pain

Three main reasons cause pain inside the hip joint. They are: . 

  1. Arthritis such as osteoarthritis. We treat osteoarthritis which happens when the cartilage that protects and cushions the ends of your wears down. 
  2. Labral tears and other impingement problems.  Sometimes the way the ball and socket fit together isn’t quite right. Other times, the ball at the top of your femur doesn’t move right within the socket. We treat this condition with physical therapy, regenerative medicine and/or surgery. If you’d like to avoid surgery, let’s discuss physical therapy and regenerative medicine, first.
  3. Inflammation and fluid in the joint.  Inflammation and fluid found in the hip joint are symptoms. When we examine your hip, we look for the actual cause of the inflammation and/or fluid.Once we correctly diagnose, we can then decide on the appropriate treatment. 

.For any of these conditions, making the right diagnosis is key.  X-ray is usually necessary, and we will let you know if you may need ultrasound, which we do right in the office. 

Extra-articular hip pain.

Numerous tendons, nerves and other structures cross near the hip joint that can cause pain.  Through careful diagnosis, our extensive experience and by using certain diagnostic tools like ultrasound during your appointment, we can figure out what is causing pain outside of your joint. Depending on the diagnosis, many treatment options are available which we will discuss during your appointment. 

Referred pain.  

Pain caused from an inflamed disc in your back can cause all sorts of pain and numbness across your lower back, into your buttocks, through your hips and down your legs. Large networks of nerves make their way through and around the hip and pelvis. These nerves can produce signals from nearby structures that seem like hip pain but are really a different structure sending pain to the hip.  Sometimes, this diagnosis takes time due to the fact that it can be difficult to determine the source of the pain. During your appointment, we will do our best to narrow down the source of the pain and create an initial treatment plan. 

How Integrative Sports Medicine Can Help With Your Hip Pain

Referral to Other Community Experts.  Integrative Sports Medicine takes a broad and horizontal look at the community and uses many other providers as part of the team.  You might be surprised at what the community can offer. Physical Therapy can help, and there are many other new and exciting treatment options.

Biologic and Regenerative Therapies.  It is astonishing what legitimate, FDA-compliant and researched new therapies can do.  We offer the highest quality products and minimally-invasive procedures available at a value that will surprise you in comparison with surgery.  New science gives us more non-surgical options, and we constantly look for the best evidence and outcomes for you. If surgery is your best option, we will let you know that; not everyone is a perfect candidate for regenerative therapies.  

A Functional Approach.  We care that you are hurt, and we also intensely care exactly the sequence of events that led to how you got hurt.  We are talking timelines, details, movement patterns, behaviors, stressors, and any kind of demand that was put on you and your body to produce the problem.  There is always cause and effect. We want to go back in time and figure out how to not repeat the pattern that got you here.  

Injections, Activity Modification and other Therapies.  We offer the full spectrum of treatments, including injections of all kinds, from long-lasting steroid injections to regenerative medicine.  We also think through your situation in detail about anything else we can recommend.  

Care, Study and Follow-Through.  We believe that part of caring for you is actually caring about you.  We collect data about you over time to track your progress. This allows us to know over time what actually works, in addition to keeping up with the latest research.

Treatment on your Terms. Integrative Sports Medicine will work with you to develop a comprehensive and minimally-invasive treatment plan without ignoring any surgical or non-surgical details.  You get to discuss all of this with us and you get to have exactly as much autonomy as you would like. Some people say: “What would you have your parent or sibling do?” and that is fine.  A heavy dose of autonomy in choosing your personalized treatment plan is just fine with us as well.