Hip Replacement Life Expectancy

Hip replacement is also called hip arthroplasty. It is a dramatic surgery. The top of the femur is actually cut off and a stake with a ball and socket on top of it is driven into the remaining shaft of the femur. That artificial ball and socket serves as the new hip joint. Frequently hip replacements involve some form of revision.

Hip Replacement Life Expectancy

There is not a lot of data as to what the life expectancy is of those initial hip replacements or the revisions.

An article in the British journal, Lancet does contain some interesting data as to how revised and multiply revised hip replacements last. Lancet Rheumatol, 2022; 4:e468-79. Essentially what this data shows is that among approximately 29,000 revisions, hip replacements are effective for improving pain and function. Usually they last a remarkably long time. If however they are revised, then successive revisions are progressively and markedly less successful. Younger patients are at increased risk of multiple revisions. Patients who undergo revision have a steadily increasing risk of further revision, the more procedures they undergo. Each subsequent revision lasts for approximately half the time of the previous one.

After revision of a primary total hip replacement, approximately 21% of the first revisions were revised again with in 15 years. Approximately 22% of second revisions were revised again within 7 years. Approximately 22% of third revisions were revised again within 3 years.

Hip Replacement – Overuse

There is a large cadre of orthopedic surgeons who specialize in hip replacements. Certainly this form of surgery is necessary in many cases. It is probably much overused in particular among seniors. A primary indicator for hip replacement is extensive pain. Even though the pain may be difficult to deal with, the prospect of doing a hip replacement on someone who is 70 years of age is probably not a good bet. The hip replacement may well produce some years of pain-free existence but it also probably dooms that person to a second hip replacement within the next 5 years. That is not a happy prospect.

Malpractice

There may be an element of malpractice in some of these hip replacements. For instance doing a hip replacement on a 45 year-old, short of that person being in an extreme situation, may well be malpractice per se. Such a procedure dooms that person to multiple major revisions/replacements. That again is not a happy prospect.

Call, or contact us for a free consult. Also for more info on hip replacement life expectancy see the Wikipedia pages. Also see the post on this site dealing with malpractice issues.