Had my follow-up appointment with my orthopedic surgeon at BMC today. He reviewed the MRI I had done two weeks ago and didn’t have good news. He is pretty sure I have avascular necrosis. For those that don’t know what this is…
The hip joint is one of the true ball-and-socket joints of the body. The hip socket is called the acetabulum and forms a deep cup that surrounds the ball of the upper thigh bone. The thigh bone itself is called the femur, and the ball on the end is the femoral head. Thick muscles of the buttock at the back and the thick muscles of the thigh in the front surround the hip.
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Due to its high complexity, free vascularized fibular grafting for the hip is performed at only a few medical centers throughout the country by fellowship-trained Orthopaedic Surgeons, who are highly experienced with this procedure. Vascularized fibular grafting involves removal of dead bone from the “ball” of the hip that has poor or no blood supply and replacing it with a healthy, vascularized (blood-rich) bone from the lower leg, the fibula. A portion of the fibula (the smaller bone in the lower leg) is removed with its own blood vessels and then inserted into the “ball” of the hip. With use of a microscope, the blood vessels of the fibula are then attached to the blood vessels around the hip to restore blood flow to the “ball.”
