Things I wish I’d known before hip replacement surgery, but wasn’t told.

1. Don’t even consider having hip-replacement surgery performed by anyone other

than Dr. Paul Duwelius, or by someone who uses his procedure (a 3-inch incision)

and has his experience. (11782 S. W. Barnes Rd. #300, Portland, OR 97225,

phone 503-214-5255).

2. Dr. Duwelius performs 6 hip replacements every operation day. Ask to be the first

operation of the day so that you’ll have the possibility of same-day discharge.

3. Get a new sweat suit and a new set of underwear to take to Portland. Wash them

all, dry them, and put them in some container where they can stay as antiseptic as

possible. Before surgery they have you shower twice with a special antiseptic

soap. My underwear and sweat suit were brand new, but I hated to put them on

because they weren’t as clean as I was.

4. Oxycodone is a powerful narcotic. You’ll be given a prescription for 30 pills when

you leave the hospital. I didn’t fill the prescription, and I never needed the

medicine. After leaving the hospital my pain level was such that I never even took

the Tylenol that was prescribed. All I ever took was one aspirin a day to keep my

blood thinned.

5. You can’t shower until the 4th day after the operation. At that point I was shocked

to discover that my surgery leg was swollen, and we had to undertake a quick

regimen to keep me in bed with my leg elevated. It was a mistake to stay dressed

those first 4 days. My recommendation is to daily drop your pants and have your

spouse make a visual inspection.

6. Think about where you’re going to sit and lie when you get home. You’ll only

have 2 or 3 places where you can be. Your bed needs to be high so that you can

back up to it and sit down. Mine was 28” high, and was just right. Your chair

needs to be stable, with arms, and can be made higher by adding a cushion from

another chair.

7. Have a big car in which to come home from the hospital. Little cars are hard to get

into.

8. Empty your bowels before surgery, and then maybe you can go 2-3 days without

having to sit on the toilet. The raised toilet seat is perhaps the worst thing about the

whole hip-replacement procedure.

9. Expectations:

A.  It was 2 weeks before I left the house. I could have gone somewhere on the 10th day, and was anxious for a change of scenery, but didn’t go anywhere because of ice and snow.
B.  My pain level never went above 2 or 3 on their scale of 10.
C.  I took crutches to Portland, but wished I’d only taken my cane. My cane was my constant companion for 7 days. I could have abandoned it on the 10th day, but continued to use it as a precaution. (You use your cane on your good side. I didn’t know that.)
D.  It took 3 weeks until I was walking as well as I was before the operation. I think I can walk fairly normally now (a month after the operation), but I have to concentrate to do it because I’m in the habit of favoring that leg.
My biggest worry was blood clots. They’re possible for 3 months. I quit wearing the anti-embolism hose at about 3 weeks, though.
Your spouse can expect to “get up with the baby” again several times a night for the first 5-7 days.
My bed was very uncomfortable because I could only lie on my back. After one week I could sit down on the low sofa and stretch out on it. At that point I abandoned my bed. The sofa was much more comfortable because I could change positions and raise my bad leg up and let it lean on the back of the couch. On the 18th day I got to where I could roll over onto my good side. It felt so good to have a new position. I went back to my bed then.

10. If you have trouble lifting your leg into bed or up onto an elevation, hook the

crook of your cane over your toes, flex your toes into the cane, and you can lift

your leg without calling for help. You can also dress yourself by using your

cane. Run the straight end of the cane up the trousers leg of your bad leg, and

then your foot can follow the cane into the pants leg.

11. A month after my surgery I still couldn’t put the sock and shoe on my surgery

leg.

12. Don’t plan on driving for about three weeks. I couldn’t lift my foot to get it up

on the pedal until the 18th day.

13. I had my surgery 30 November 2005. Four or five months later I decided that I

could clean up my barnlot, which involved a lot of bending over to pick up sticks.

I got the old, familiar shooting pains going down my leg. The pains went away

when I concentrated on never bending that hip joint beyond a 90-degree angle.

Three years after the surgery, I still try to avoid much bending beyond 90-degrees,

and I've had no further trouble.

14. The summer of 2007 I hiked the entire 25-mile Elkhorn Crest Trail in one day.

My only trouble was blisters on my feet for the last several miles. I love my new

hip.

—James E. Kerns