Seattle Health Blog

What is hip?

A prosthesis is a device that is implanted to perform a particular function that the body has lost or done very defective.

The hip joint is the socket that are at the head of the femur bone, semi-spherical shape, with the acetabulum of the pelvis, which is a cavity of the hip bone as well hemisphere.

The hip is placed in the place of the hip joint.

What materials does it compose from?

Used metal alloys, titanium, ceramics and polymers. At present, only these materials the most suitable strength, durability and performance to the efforts suffer once implanted in the human body.

What parts make it up?

We must differentiate partial dentures of the total.The dentures

Replacing both the femoral head and the acetabulum. The part that is anchored in the femur is called the stem and added a hemisphere or head, which is the joint.

- The stem is anchored to the bone making the surface is rough or hydroxyapatite coatings. If the bone is poor anchoring is done by a layer of special cement between the stem and bone

- The prosthetic socket has a portion that is anchored to the pelvis and a piece of polyethylene is the prosthetic head contact. The bone anchor may be under pressure, screwed, screwed or cemented.

Partial dentures

Replacing only the femoral head, leaving the pelvis intact. The prosthetic head can form a single block with the stem (Thompson prosthesis type) or be removable in isolation, which would eventually become a full denture: when placing a prosthetic socket, the head of the stem must be smaller than in partial dentures.

Never replace only the socket of the pelvis.

Replacement prostheses or rescue are used when the first prosthesis and the bone has worn loose. They tend to have more pieces to fit the areas of bone loss. The problem is that the greater the number of pieces more friction between them, and waste or chips fall off, injuring more bone.

credit to: Dr. Roberto Palacio González, Dr. Alain Vannineuse