The Doctor gets hip

Most of my friends are hip to this, but for those of you who may not be...



Summer before last I started having pain in my right hip/groin area. I figured I just aggravated a muscle or something. The problem never went away so I went to see an orthopedist, thinking I must have torn something tendon/ligament-wise. As it turns out I was diagnosed with avascular necrosis (AVN), which is a disease that inhibits blood circulation to the extremeties of bones. Bottom line- the ball of my right femur that fits into the hip socket was basically dying, and there was no cure. My doctor gave me but one option, which was a total hip replacement. I sought out 2 more opinions to be sure, and both of them confirmed the initial diagnosis.


Here are my x-rays of my left and right hips. You can clearly see the difference in the femur heads, with the right being mostly round and the left being all chopped off from necrosis of the bone.

Left (above)




Right (above)

So here I was, a fairly active 47 year old guy, and I had a crumbling hip that was causing me more pain than I had ever experienced or even imagined. I got some pain pills but they only took the edge off- nothing ever made the pain go away. At first I felt like my life had come to a screeching halt and I was pretty distraught over it.

Fortunately though, as the initial collapse of my femur subsided so did the pain, to an extent. But even though the pain was not extreme it was still always there, and it wasn't going away. My doctor recommended that I wait as long as possible for the THR (total hip replacement) as the parts are not yet durable enough to last more than 15-20 years, meaning that if I lived long enough Iwould require another replacement later. I was okay with that, until my doctor then became reluctant to provide me with the pain medication I needed to cope with the problem. So I changed doctors, to one of the guys who I went to for a second opinion. I really liked this guy from the start, and I heard from others that he was the best there was for this condition.


Eventually I got tired of being in pain and went back to see the new doctor again. His name is Kenneth Kress by the way. Dr. Kress advised me that nobody knows what will happen to them in the future, and there was no reason to continue on in pain, and that quality of life is what was important. This validated my feeling that there was no reason to wait until my 60's to get better when my 50's would be wasted, not doing the things I wanted to do in my life.

So now I am going in to get my right hip replaced with metal parts on Monday. I'm first in line, so I told the nurse I didn't want the doctor out partying all night. There's no warming up on somebody else, he has to bring his A game right away. I'm scared shitless, but I can't wait to get this done. I want my life back. Wish me luck.

Arlen Specter's Wall of Sound

Last week Senator Arlen Specter jumped the Republican ship to be a Democrat after the GOP let him know that they wouldn't be supporting him in the next election. While the Dems were probably happy about this initially, there was a collective WTF moment from the left side of the aisle when Specter showed support for Republican Norm Coleman in the still as yet decided Minnesota senate race in a recent NY Times interview, saying that the courts should "do justice" and select Coleman as the winner. Note to Specter: It's probably best not to piss off the people who you were counting on to maintain your Senate seniority. D'oh!

Later, Specter responded to his gaffe by saying he "misspoke", which is just another word for being taken to the woodshed by Harry Reid. Specter valiantly tried to clarify by adding "In the swirl of moving from one caucus to another, I have to get used to my new teammates." Okay then. So what he's saying is that he initially supported Coleman because he was a Republican, and then suddenly remembered "Oh crap, wait a minute, I'm a Democrat now! Let me change my answer!"

You've got to love a man of conviction.

You know, our government wouldn't be half bad if it weren't for all the damn politicians.