When a young person has a hip disorder, we focus on restoring and preserving hip health before exploring surgical options. While hip replacements are effective, they require lifelong upkeep. Hip preservation allows young people to live active and healthy lifestyles without being beholden to more replacement throughout life.
Hip Care (Adolescent + Young Adult)
Preserving hip health from an early age
We use our hips every day, whether we’re playing sports, climbing stairs or sitting on the couch. That’s why hip injuries and chronic conditions can have a major impact on our quality of life. But that doesn’t have to be the case forever.
At Tufts Medicine, we’re here to help everyone have healthy hips and happy lives from adolescence through adulthood. Our preventive approach applies the most least invasive treatment options and turns to surgery only as a last resort. That way, young people can enjoy the activities they love most with the least amount of downtime.
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Conditions
A healthy hip joint is made up of 2 main parts:
- A ball (the femoral head) at the top of your thigh bone (femur)
- A round socket called the acetabulum in the pelvis
With hip preservation, we can treat problems caused by congenital disorders (those you’re born with), sports injuries or other factors like physique. The most common hip conditions we treat are:
Avascular necrosis
Developmental dysplasia of the hip (DDH)
Early onset of arthritis
Femoroacetabular impingement (FAI)
Perthes disease
Slipped capital epiphysis and other pediatric hip disorders
Treatments
How we treat a young person's hip depends on their goals and overall health. Our first course of action is to explore conservative, nonsurgical treatments for people under the age of 50 before we consider surgery.
Hip replacement implants and surgical techniques have improved dramatically in recent years. Although today's hip implants are very durable, they can exclude people from many high-impact activities. And because implants last about 15 years, the longer a young person keeps their natural hip, the fewer replacement surgeries they'll need over a lifetime.
Our team of hip specialists is dedicated to helping young people preserve their hip health. And once they mature into adulthood, we can seamlessly transition their treatment to our hip programs for adults.
Related services + treatments
Department of Orthopaedic Surgery + Rehabilitation Medicine
Academic Department
Our orthopedic specialists are redefining what’s possible in musculoskeletal care through advanced surgical techniques, innovative rehabilitation and groundbreaking research, helping patients regain mobility, restore function and return to the lives they love.
