Hip Pain

Hip pain is a general term that can stem from pain on the side of your leg, buttock pain radiating into the thigh and/or pain in the front of your leg by the groin. The area of the hip is surrounded in the front, back and sides by muscles and small pads that cushion the tendons of these muscles called Bursa. Any or all of these structures can become inflamed, injured or torn and lead to hip and leg pain.

What Causes Hip and Leg Pain?

Bursitis is a painful condition that affects the small fluid-filled pads called bursathat act as cushions among your bones, tendons and muscles near your joints. Bursitis occurs when a bursa becomes inflamed.

If you have bursitis, the affected joint may:

  • Feel achy or stiff
  • Hurt more when you move it or press on it
  • Look swollen and red   

Osteoarthritis sometimes called degenerative joint disease is the most common form of arthritis and occurs when cartilage in your joints wears down over time. This causes the normal smooth surfaces of the joint that glide over each other as you move to become rough and jagged. The normal fluid inside the joint is called Synovial fluid and functions to lubricate and cushion movement. With arthritis, the amount of Synovial fluid decreases and breaks down, causing increased wear and tear on the joint.

Osteoarthritis gradually worsens with time and no cure exists, but osteoarthritis treatments can help you relieve pain, increase mobility, slow down the wear and tear and help you remain active. The earlier you treat osteoarthritis the better!

Osteoarthritis symptoms include:

  • Pain: Your joint(s) may hurt during or after movement. Pain is often felt arising from a seated position, using stairs, and/ or crossing your leg.
  • Tenderness: Your joint may feel tender when you apply light pressure to it
  • Stiffness: Joint stiffness may be most noticeable when you wake up in the morning or after a period of inactivity
  • Loss of flexibility: You may not be able to move your joint through its full range of motion
  • Grating sensation: You may hear or feel a grating sensation when you use the joint
  • Bone spurs: These extra bits of bone, which feel like hard lumps, may form around the affected joint

Piriformis Syndrome is a common neuromuscular disorder that is caused when the piriformis musclelocated in the buttock area behind your hip tightens. This can cause hip and buttock pain, as well as compression of the sciatic nerve. This muscle is important in lower body movement because it stabilizes the hip joint and lifts and rotates the thigh away from the body. This enables us to walk, shift our weight from one foot to another, and maintain balance. It is also used in sports that involve lifting and rotating the thighs.

Piriformis symptoms include:

  • Pain that can be triggered climbing steps, applyingfirm pressure in the buttock area and extended sitting.
  • Numbness or tingling into the leg
  • Sciatica pain or tingling radiating down the leg

How Is Hip Pain Diagnosed?

History and Examination: A history of your complaints including duration, what makes it better and worse is very important. Previous treatments and outcomes, as well as orthopedic examination of the muscles, joint, movement and strength are also used for diagnosis.

X-rays: Plain X-rays can reveal narrowing of the space in the joint, arthritis like diseases and bone spurs that can interfere with movement.

MRI: Magnetic Resonance Imaging is a noninvasive procedure that can reveal the detail of joint including an important fibro-cartilaginous cup or rim that supports the hip joint called the Labrum.

Myelography/CT scanning: Sometimes used as an alternative to MRI

Diagnostic Ultrasound Imaging: Unlike an x-ray, diagnostic ultrasound allows us to view the most common causes of yourhip pain with great accuracy. The bundles muscles, tendons, bursa, joint capsule and the front portion of the labrum can be examined for signs of swelling or inflammation. If the symptoms are only on one side, the symptomatic side can be compared with the non-symptomatic side. With musculoskeletal ultrasound imaging (MSUS), the joint can be accurately examined at the time of your visit.

Treatment Options We Offer

Why are ultrasound-guided injections better and more accurate?

When using an injection to deliver treatment into painful joints, it is necessary to be exact and precise.

Dr. Bilbool and her team are highly trained in ultrasound-guided injections. These procedures are performed in the office, at the time of your visit. Some of the common structures involved in joint pain may be as little as 2-3mm wide and therefore require a high level of precision to be accurate. In addition, when performing an injection, there are also structures that you want to avoid so you don’t knick or damage them on your way into the joint. The ultrasound machine provides live imaging in real time, to safely place injectable medications or treatments into or around the joint with laser-like precision.

Consider trying to hit a target blindfolded¾you may know the general direction but would not be certain if you have actually hit your target. With live ultrasound imaging, the targeted areas of pain are viewed in real time while the injection is taking place, guiding the needle with pin-point accuracy!

New Treatment Using LIPOGEMS® Could Be the Answer for Arthritis Pain

LIPOGEMS® is a new treatment option for arthritis pain now offered by Dr. Norma Bilbool, M.D., a double board certified physician specializing in Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation and Pain Medicine and Richard D. Striano D.C., RMSK Registered in Diagnostic Medical Musculoskeletal Sonography. The combination of advanced imaging techniques with ultrasound to diagnose and precisely guide treatment, and physician experience with treating all joints with minimally invasiveLIPOGEMS® has led to the majority of patients treated having significant improvement with less pan, improved function and quality of life.

LIPOGEMS® could be the solution to those who suffer from pain in the shoulder, lower back, hip, knee, ankle and other joints including the rotator. Optimum Joint, is equipped and has been performing ongoing clinical studies on the shoulder, rotator cuff, lower back, hip and ankle pain where a patient’s own fat is used to alleviate arthritis related conditions many of which have failed to respond to other treatment methods including bone-on-bone joints. Optimum was among the first practices in the USA trained in the state-of-the-art treatment through LIPOGEMS® technology that is a minimally invasive same day procedure, performed in about an hour, using local anesthetic with no sedation required and no down time. This could be the answer for many of those looking to avoid surgery.

The Autologous (fat from you and put back into you) Micro-Fragmented Adipose Tissue (LIPOGEMS®) is a NEW technology where fat is taken from the patient, using a local anesthetic, washed, and micro-fragmented, using the LIPOGEMS® system. Micro-fragmented fat using the LIPOGEMS® system mechanically supports and cushions joints, and holds regenerative capabilities and when re-injected can decrease inflammation, cushion, repair or replace defects in damaged tendons and cartilage, or other tissue.

The fat is injected using continuous ultrasound guidance to ensure pin point accuracy in treating the joint and surrounding damaged tendons to repair and restructure damaged tissue with pin-point accuracy. Research has shown non-guided “blind” injections are accurate 36% – 60% of the time while ultrasound guided injections are 100% accurate. Accuracy in delivering regenerative treatments is essential. We are evaluating the LIPOGEMS®, made with an FDA cleared device, for their ability to cushion, repair, or replace damaged tissue and the regenerative effects of the fat it contains, to jump-start repair and decrease inflammation.

“This is an extraordinary study because of its use of micro-fragmented fat tissue, which makes it more bioavailable to the area we inject, and by using the precision of ultrasound guidance the treatment is visualized being delivered to each area of the joint and tissues in need of repair. This combination of support and regenerative regenerative elements with the precision of advanced ultrasound guidance is contributing to the long term impressive results.

 NEW STUDY: Adipose tissue contains Adipose Derived Stem Cells “ADSC’s” and more than 600 secreted proteins and included key molecules involved in tissue regeneration. Stem Cell Res Ther. 2015; 6: 221.

NEW STUDY: Lipogems Product Treatment Increases the Proliferation Rate of Human Tendon Stem Cells without Affecting Their Stemness and Differentiation Capability. Results showed that the Lipogems product significantly increases the proliferation rate of hTSCs (human tendon stem cells). Moreover, treated cells increase the expression of VEGF, which is crucial for tissue healing. Stem Cells International Volume 2016 (2016), Article ID 4373410, 11 pages

Dr’s Bilbool and Striano are among few doctors in the country offering IRB- approved regenerative treatment options, with a focus on minimally invasive alternatives to surgery. Their work has been recognized and new studies are being published this year.

Cortisone Injection:

Painful arthritic joints, chronic tendinitis, bursitis and inflammation respond quickly to cortisone. In many cases this is the head start patients need to allow for gains with more conservative care and no further treatment is required. Many patients think that cortisone is bad for you. Too much of anything is not good. Using cortisone infrequently, as much as several times per year will not do any harm. If the pain continues to return, other treatment options should be considered.

Cortisone is injected using continuous live ultrasound guidance exactly where it is needed to quickly reduce inflammation and pain.

Lubrication for Arthritis:

Why Hyalgan?

A squeaky gear needs the most oil!

The joints of the body are normally surrounded by a lubricant and shock absorber called Synovial fluid. Patients with osteoarthritis experience pain and inflammation because arthritic damage in thejoint causes the Synovial fluid to break down over time.

This process causes increased friction and excess wear and tear on the cartilage cushioning movement that becomes rough and jagged causing the joint further deteriorate. Range of motion, walking, getting up from a seated position, climbing and descending steps and weight bearing is often painful. Pain is often increased during or after activity.

What is Hyalgan?

Hyalgan is a naturally derived lubricant that instantly cushions and lubricates painful arthritic joints. By restoring lubrication and cushion, your joints move more freely again with less friction and most importantly, less pain. Hyalgan is injected using continuous live ultrasound guidance ensuring pin-point accuracy exactly where it is needed.

Platelet Rich Plasma Therapy (PRP): Jump starting the healing signals:

Why use PRP?

When there is damage, tissue tears or arthritis, this exciting new procedure (made popular by professional athletes) that heals damaged structures in a joint such as the labrum, tendons, muscle, ligament or cartilage is showing exciting results!

How does PRP work?

When you cut your skin and it bleeds, platelets collect and gather at the wound site. Once there, platelets act like a conductor in an orchestra. They release growth factors that signal the healing activities to begin, resulting in a cascade of events that restore the damaged tissue.

Joints, however, do not have a direct blood supply. Therefore, when a joint structure is damaged or torn, platelets do not gather and orchestrate the necessary events for that damage to be restored. Joint damage either heals slowly or not at all. That is where Platelet Rich Plasma Therapy (PRP) proves valuable!

How is the procedure performed?

By taking a small sample of your blood, a special centrifuge concentrates and separates the platelets, growth factors and specialized white blood cells from the other components of the blood. This super concentrated PRP is then injected using continuous ultrasound guidance into the cracks and crevices of the damaged area. The orchestra of events is stimulated and the tissue begins to heal. The result is reduced inflammation and pain.

Have you tried Physical Therapy in the past and it hasn’t worked for you?

A Different Approach Other Than Routine Painful Exercises:

We see many patients who come to us in chronic pain. Many have also had experience with physical therapy where they spent much of their sessions doing exercises and it hasn’t helped. Think of being in pain, having joint stiffness, loss of range of motion or chronic inflammation and then doing exercises to get rid of it. In most cases, you’ll feel worse not better.

Exercise is critical to maintain proper joint strength, but done at the wrong time and your pain often becomes worse. That is why we take an entirely different approach with treatment plans using three phases:

  • Therapeutic Modalities:

Our physical therapy team specializes in using certain modalities like electrical stimulation or ultrasound to reduce swelling and inflammation and increases local circulation to help the healing process. Different modalities can be applied to successfully address spasm, trigger points, inflammation, edema, swelling and damage from tendonitis and tears.

  • Joint Release Techniques:

Techniques are done by hand to gently stretch, massage and release the pressure in each of the muscles, tendons and ligaments surrounding the joint. The result is a soothing improvement in joint pain.

  • The Selective Functional Movement Assessment:

Our physical therapy team is certified in the Selective Functional Movement Assessment (SFMA), which is a series of 7 full body movement tests designed to assess fundamental patterns of movement such as bending and squatting in those with known joint pain. When the clinical assessment is initiated from the perspective of the movement pattern, our therapy team has the opportunity to identify meaningful impairments that may be seemingly unrelated to the main joint pain complaint, but contribute to the pain.

Think of having a painful right knee and favoring that side for an extended period of time. Following a period of uneven gait you may develop pain on the opposite unrelated side. This concept, known as Regional Interdependence, is the hallmark of the SFMA.

The assessment guides our clinical physical therapist to the most dysfunctional non-painful movement pattern, which is then assessed in detail. By addressing the most dysfunctional non-painful pattern, the application of targeted interventions (manual therapy and therapeutic exercise) is not adversely affected by pain.

When to see a doctor

  • Your activity is being restricted by pain
  • Before you pain becomes severe
  • Pain is getting worse or not improving in two weeks
  • Sharp or shooting pain, especially when you exercise or exert yourself
  • A fever
  • Swelling or stiffness in your joints that lasts for more than two weeks

 

 

Can an OptimumJoint traditional or regenerative medical procedure help me? To find out if you might be a candidate for an OptimumJoint medical treatment procedure, complete our Optimum Joint Procedure Candidate Form online.