Perthes in 4 yr. old-Hip ball gone, growth plate 1/3 gone, & now femur thigh bone is defragmenting

Hello luke 4,

Wow, you have your hands full for sure! As an adult I use a lot of natural treatments to help reduce my pain, I use actupunture. I also have a chiropractor when my hip, as I call it gets out of adjustment, which causes horrible back pain, knee pain, and foot. I also have an osteopath.  I am really thinking about this. As a child, Mom said I ran and jumped, etc and not until a teacher noticed that I didn't have the same range of motion as the other childen was I then taken to Childrens Hospital in Los Angeles.  LCPD varries so much from person to person.  I would certainly explore help to get the body to accept calicum and the other minerals that LCPD children's bodies reject. Pehaps a Naturalpath doctor. Also you have already found ways to help with the pain, this is good. Try everything within reason for that.  As an adult I can say, somedays the pain is totally awful.  Getting a 2nd opinion is also smart. May I suggest a clinic that treats a lot of LCPD children. This disease is not very common with doctors.  UCLA has a good program and also Childrens Hospital, anyplace that treats a lot of children with LCPD. For reasons unknown, the body will stop rejecting and start rebuilding bone mass like other kids. Please seek a specialist in LCPD.  I have seen so many adults that might have had a better outcome if different treatments were tried. Non traditional treatments are great but with bone loss, I am thinking the bone needs to be replaced. A person needs to balance both. Don't give up, I know you will find the help you need. Keep searching. I hope I was able to help a tiny bit, I know its hard, You will find the answer. 

I can give an opinion from treatment that was given to my son in the UK, he had Perthes from 3 years old and suffered severe degeneration of the head of the femur. His surgeon was a highly qualified Paediatric Orthopaedic surgeon with the highest reputation in the UK regarding treating Perthes, his treatment is to stop children walking on bones that are in this stage of Perthes and walking is only allowed once the bone has regenerated, his reason for this is because it is so important for the bone to stay rounded, enabling it to remain in the hip socket. The bone is very soft and damage is very easy, children being allowed to walk, run and jump frequently can have a poorer result in recovery. My son was in a wheelchair and non weightbearing for 5 years, he suffered severe pain and took medication for this but when it got too bad he was put on traction which we eventually did ourselves at home. It was a very difficult time but his hip did regenerate enough bone to be able to walk again, and it stayed rounded and in its socket. At 14 now, he is having some pain again which is being looked into, it may be linked to growth, I hope, but we have been referred to a specialist Paediatric Ortho again, our old one has retired unfortunately. With your son being so young, I would seriously question his treatment, get a second opinion from a specialist that treats Perthes children. With regards to pain relief, complete rest is one of the best forms, heat treatment can also help but if it gets too bad proper pain relief is necessary, bone pain can be agonising and sometimes we need to resort to proper medications to make our children comfortable. 

Hey, how's your little one getting on nowadays? My son has perthes in both hips and X-ray yesterday showed damage to growth plate. Doc said we need to keep an eye on it and go back in 12 months. Bit worried about this as have read damage to growth plate can mean stopping growing. For your little one this is just over a year since you posted so I'm wondering if he's still growing as he should be and with equal leg lenghts.

Hoping to hear from you very soon

kat