Problems diagnosed as Osteoarthritis CAN be cured in some cases.
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If you're a proactive individual that's been diagnosed with incurable Osteoarthritis it's *possible* that you can in fact beat the diagnosis and get back to full fitness and functionality. It happened to me.
I should add that I was diagnosed at age 42 and was very fit and active at the time. I think it might be very different for older individuals, people who's condition is advanced, or people that don't enjoy exercise.
Here's my story. I can't make any promises that it'll be the same for you. But I will if people are interested share some of the resources that helped me to beat what I considered to be a life shattering diagnosis, for which I was assured there was no possibility of a cure. I don't know whether to believe I was misdiagnosed and never actually had Osteoarthritis, or whether they're wrong when they say Osteoarthritis is incurable. What I can say is that I was told my symptoms were 'classic' and that the diagnosis was certain - that my symptoms couldn't be explained by anything else. The whole area is so poorly defined and slap-dash that it's impossible to tell. Either way, it means there's at least hope of beating it if that's what you want to try and do.
I've spent 8 years battling against the people that were hell bent on brow beating me into believing I had Hip Osteoarthritis when I knew I didn't. My real problems were ignored - I was essentially left to rot. I was treated like an idiot. Told I researched too much. That I was in denial. Told that I was making my problems worse by training to keep myself fit, strong and active. Told I should swim and cycle and give up all other sports. I was asked repeatedly "You've had numerous experts try to help you - don't you think one of them would have succeeded if this really was curable?".
Finally I've been vindicated. I figured it out for myself. A simple, treatable muscle imbalance causing all of my problems. Obviously I wanted to let the people know that have tried to help over the years. I expected them to be amazed - a breakthrough that could help lots of people. These cases that we think are incurable can in fact be fixed!!
My excitement was met with apathy: [paraphrasing]. "The reality is that most people are inactive and unwilling to put in the work needed to address muscle imbalances like this. Even if the correct diagnosis was made, for most people the end result would be the same. People who are willing to put in the work necessary to reverse the condition are so few and far between that they aren't statistically significant to make it worth the cost of training and research. We were unable to solve your problem because we've not been adequately trained to do so. But well done for hanging in and figuring it out yourself."
Why wasn't I told this BEFORE I discovered the solution for myself? Why did they try to convince me I had incurable OA when they knew how determined I was to beat it?
Here's the reality as I now understand it (as it's been explained to me). This may not reflect every health professionals view, but it is a summary of what I've been told by various health professionals:
GP's are responsible for diagnosing OA. Yet they know very little about bio mechanics (unless they've got an interest and educate themselves).
They don't understand the condition in great detail, but they don't need to. They're working to a script. It seems not to be widely known who writes that script (so who to go to with questions or doubts)...which is a little bit of a worry.
Some know that often it's a misdiagnosis - more forward thinking GP's are aware that it's frequently a treatable soft tissue issue. But like the physios, think it doesn't matter too much as for most patients it makes no difference. They lead inactive lifestyles and any attempts to restore them to full functionality will fail. There is little point in wasting resources trying to give an accurate diagnosis when the end result will usually be the same regardless. So OA is the 'catch all' category you put them in. There is no cure - you manage with drugs and operate if and when necessary.
Even when someone is in great shape, keen to be proactive in their treatment and has an active lifestyle worth preserving there's nothing to be gained in finding the correct diagnosis as there is no one to refer them to to get it fixed. People worth bothering with (because they can be restored to a good, active life) aren't statistically significant enough to be worth the research and training needed to put systems in place to help them.
So, the GP's make the OA diagnosis despite not necessarily knowing much about OA. Who are the specialists then if you're determined to find the real cause of your joint stiffness or pain? Well, there's a bit of an oversight there. There is no one.
Orthopedic surgeons know about surgery. If your problem is an easily curable soft tissue issue they probably won't know enough to detect it. They may well put you under the knife unnecessarily. Or tell you that you have an incurable problem that will deteriorate over time - that your active life is over (that's what happened to me). But this is more a case of them forcing your problem into something that fits their specialist knowledge. Not a proper diagnosis.
Then there's physios. They aren't trained to detect and treat curable soft tissue problems that lead to joint wear and might otherwise be diagnosed as OA. However, some are better than others. Some might actually be very capable. It's pot luck. I think it's unlikely to find someone with these skills working for the NHS, but I may be wrong. I have been told (by a physio) that the failure rate in these cases is 99% within the NHS.
There are people out there that do know how to diagnose and treat these soft tissue problems. And there's plenty of info on this on the internet that you can use to help yourself. It's down to the individual to separate the wheat from the chaff. Contrary to what we are led to believe, OA isn't an incurable degenerative disease. Strictly speaking it doesn't exist. It's a 'catch all' diagnosis used to put people with joint problems in when there aren't resources and training to find out and fix what's really wrong with them. Contrary to what we're led to believe, there is no category of the medical profession with expertise in the multitude of conditions commonly labeled as OA. If you think you've seen an expert and had a reliable diagnosis of OA - think again.
There is no easy fix - that's true. There is no way of knowing if yours is a curable soft tissue problem without trying to fix it. I'm led to believe that official research into OA is centered around keeping this 99% of people that are deemed incurable (because they are perceived to be inactive and unwilling or unable to adhere to the required rehab plan), as pain free and independent as possible at minimum cost. It's simply not cost effective to put time and effort into finding the cause, the cure, or training people to make diagnosis and cure soft tissue problems in the cases where how to do so is already known by some.
But there are people out there that have figured out how to diagnose and cure at least some of these cases. Some speculate that all OA is initially a soft tissue dysfunction. However, this is mainly in the private sector - or perhaps in the NHS, but on an unofficial level. You're faced with the dilemma of separating the fakes from the real deal. Most will claim to be able to help - and many will diagnose incurable OA when they fail. That doesn't necessarily mean you can't be helped. Many tried and failed with me before I figured it out for myself.
But if you're willing to work at it yourself - or maybe even find the right person (which is very difficult) then it is quite possible that what you have is very curable.
31 likes, 607 replies
susan67756
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http://www.maristowchiropractic.com/hip%20and%20groin%20pain.htm
So, your GP looked at your hip. He/she got xrays, wiggled your joint a bit, listened to your symptoms and diagnosed OA.
What you need is for someone to look at the problem holistically. Why is one shoulder too low? Why do you sit with all your weight on one side of your hip? If they (or you) figure out the answer to questions like this it'll probably fairly easy to restore good posture and you may then find you join the ranks of the majority of people with degenerative changes in their joints - symptom free!
fran64082
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The simple massage techniques make so much sense, especially as the hip does not appear to need any manipulation or massage...it's the groin that needs attention.
Talk more later. Very pleased.
susan67756
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Don't be disheartened if this doesn't give you a complete fix. I think often there will be a few things going on. But finding just one thing and solving it gives you confidence to do the rest - and if it's the thing causing your pain then better still.
But also there's every chance this is all that's wrong. I'm keeping everything crossed for you.
alison84352
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anneliz alison84352
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bea9 alison84352
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genevieve84703
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I've been following this post for a while now. I have been looking for info about twisted hips and (of course) only find stuff about OA so I am very happy to hear your stories and progress!
I started having problems about a year ago. I live in New York and am very active (yoga, soccer, running), I am 41 and am not overweight or suffering from other injuries.... So I have have been totally confused about why my hips are twisted yet no one seems to be concerned- except me of course. And I'm sick of being in pain so I'm tring to fix it. I hope to read more into your suggested reading and bring them to the attention to my physical therapist... I'll keep you all posted
susan67756
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I keep meaning to put all of the info and resources I have onto my website. I will do that soon.
Alison, I never found anyone that was able to help me. In the end it came down to me figuring it out for myself. I wasted so much money on people that had no clue (thousands of pounds) that now I'm reluctant to take a chance with anyone. The specialist that diagnosed OA (in 5 mins and at the cost of £160) is supposedly at the cutting edge - a leading specialist. Yet in my case at least he's been proven wrong beyond all doubt. But then, he's a surgeon - what would they know about muscle imbalances and movement impairments? This is part of the problem - the 'experts' in OA are surgeons so it's hardly surprising that you either need surgery or need to wait until you need surgery in their opinion!!!
That said, if I were going to give something a try...
My husband recently developed a rotator cuff problem (shoulder). He enjoys gymnastics type training so obviously this was a serious problem for him. He went to umpteen physios who all got things badly wrong, before it finally occurred to us to contact the local gymnastics clubs and find out who they used. They all told us the physios at Hampden park - these mostly work with athletes and many are leading physios with UK olympic teams. She had him sorted in no time - the difference between her and all the others we'd tried was extreme.
Now would they be good with something normally diagnosed as OA - perhaps not. But they WILL understand muscle imbalances. Not too expensive - £38 a session (half hour) and they're well equipped and have a gym for rehab.
The other thing that I considered was someone trained in PRI (Postural Restoration Institute) methods. The postural restoration institute are all about restoring balance. Leveling out pelvises is their specialty. A lot of what helped me came from their resources. I contacted them to see if I could get onto one of their self study training courses (they wouldn't let me because I'm not a health provider), but they did tell me about someone in Glasgow that had done their courses. I checked out his site and he really does seem to be quite well qualified to help figure out something like this. Perhaps worth a try?
But this isn't a personal recommendation - not someone I've tried, but someone that *seems* as if he might have the necessary skills.
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alison84352
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susan67756
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I've got a right on right sacral torsion - and there's a set exercise you can do to correct this. But you need to know what way it's twisted (if it is twisted - but I bet it is!). It helped a lot and the tight muscles suddenly loosened off and responded to stretching. Weak muscles started to respond to strength training.
Something else worth looking up is NeuroKinetic Therapy. If you're on facebook find their fb page. They regularly post up great info that helps you to understand how muscles interact, and how imbalances lead to pain and joint wear.
But there are various types of sacral torsion - anyone good at postural restoration would figure this out. You'll also find plenty of info on line describing how to test this for yourself, and the appropriate corrections.
I think there is only one person in Glasgow that's done the Postural Restoration Institute courses so probably the one you've found is the one I was suggesting.
susan67756
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Check out the case studies on the PRI website.
alison84352 susan67756
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alison84352 susan67756
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susan67756 alison84352
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I don't want to give you false hope by telling you that your physio is wrong - it's quite possible she's right. However, I've been told the same thing by various physios - and by a top sports injury consultant that specialises in this kind of thing. They seem to be trained to conclude that lack of range of motion means one thing - osteoarthritis.
They all went on about the 'hard end feel' when pushing my knee to my shoulder. I couldn't get past 90 degrees and my knee would track out. This was the main basis for the OA diagnosis. The thing is, that 'hard end feel' would move depending on what I'd been doing. The most recent physio told me on week one when the 'hard end feel' was at 90 degrees that it was bone on bone and therefore impossible to improve upon. Next time I saw him a couple of weeks later that hard end feel was at about 80 degrees - I was feeling particularly limber. Again, he told me that that 'hard end feel' was bone and bone and therefore could not be improved upon. The third time I was feeling really stiff and only managed about 100 degrees. I couldn't get it through his thick scull that his so called 'imovable bone on bone' had, according to him, moved significantly each time he tested it!!
The thing is, *IF* your hip problem is caused - for example - by the pelvis being out of alignment then no amount of stretching and mobilisation will work. The tight muscles are already overstretched. The hip won't loosen off until alignment is improved. Quite possibly in some cases (tho not mine) the head of the femur IS jamming into the socket - but that can very easily be because the joint is being pulled out of alignment. If the movement impairment can be figured out and corrected all joint symptoms *could* be gone for good.
Two years ago I had a physio tell me with 100% certainty that I'd last another year before needing a hip replacement. She told me that 70% of the restriction was caused by capsular tightness and the remaining 30% by boney restrictions. Utter clap-trap! It's now moving just fine thank you very much!!
As it turned out, the 'hard end feel' dissapears completely if I jam my finger into my iliacus muscle. In other words, what 'felt' to the highly trained physios as a hard end feel was actually a muscle in spasm!
So, don't give up hope.
I don't know why physios have such a big problem grasping this. They all seem to accept that shoulder impingement is caused by the scapular being pulled out of place by tight muscles. The same thing happens with hips but they don't seem to want to tackle that one!
What kind of pain do you get? Can you describe it? Where do you feel it?
I was always pretty flexible from karate so my big symptom was a big loss of range of motion. Soreness and stiffness, but rarely pain. If ever I did get pain it was normally down to trigger points in a particular muscle and pinpointing and massaging that normally had me pain free again.
My approach has always been to try and figure out which muscles are weak, which are tight, which are overactive and try and correct all of that. And I mean throughout my whole body. It's amazing how a tiny muscle in the shoulder can affect alignment through your whole body!
Lots of weight training. If you have problems with your hip then almost certainly strengthening your glutes will help. Reason being that if you had strong, active glutes chances are you wouldn't have a problem with your hip!! LOL
I just ran regardless of what the physios said. It never did my hip any harm, but because I was a bit wonky I tend to be prone to calf/achillies problems if I do too much. Also, if you're doing lots of running the you're probably going to be re-inforcing any movement impairment that you might have. What works for me is to keep running to short distances but run fast - that seems to get all the right muscles working. Hill sprints on grass are ideal for me. And I do one mile runs as fast as I can. Although if you love long distances I know that's probably not much fun.
But I think if you're having pain the priority is to find out why. Regardless of whether or not your hip joint is causing your symptoms it makes sense to deal with ALL soft tissue issues and restore the best possible pain free range of motion. And if it turns out you no longer have any symptoms when you've done that then that's a bonus. Physios never want to help with that though. It's too difficult. Much easier to say "get an op when the pain gets too bad".
alison84352 susan67756
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susan67756 alison84352
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The tingling is *possibly* a nerve (sciatic nerve perhaps) being irritated by tight tissue or out of place SI joint. I said before I didn't get pain, but I had 6 months of agony last year when my sciatic nerve got irritated by all the twisting in my body!! Not sure if it was the piriformis pressing on the nerve - something along those lines.
The groin soreness and abdominal dragging / tightness (crampy feeling even?) - I definitely got that. With me down to tight, overworked muscles trying to do jobs that they're not supposed to be doing. For example, if hip flexors or adductors are very tight you'll often feel the pain at the attachment point where the tugging occurs.
And the glutes that won't fire - yup! I worked so hard for years but my right glutes just refused point blank to work.
Try a little experiment. Lie flat on your back, arms stretched out to the side. Bend your knees so your feet are flat on the floor. Now, without letting your arms/shoulders lift, let your knees drop first to the right (turning head left), then to the left (turning head right). So you want your thigh and side of knee touching the ground. Keep knees together. This creates a corkscrew twist down the length of your spine.
What do you feel? Is one side tighter than the other? Try and relax in the position each side and think about what's tight.
The reason I'm asking you this, is if you have a sacral torsion/twisted pelvis then you'll have a corscrew twist up your spine and you'll find this stretch difficult to do in one direction. And that alone *could* be responsible for your symptoms. It could also be a whole host of other things!
alison84352 susan67756
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susan67756 alison84352
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I've attached an image showing the position my pelvis is 'stuck' in. This is a right on right sacral torsion. So as you can see, the sacrum (the bone at the bottom of the spine) is leaning to the RIGHT and is rotated RIGHT. With my sacrum in this position muscles around my hip are all out of place - some too loose, some too tight. Also, the head of me femur is pulled into the wrong place in the socket. All the symptoms are felt in the hip but the problem is I guess in the spine and core muscles (just muscle imbalance).
The positioning is exagerated in the diagram but it'll give you an idea.
My guess would be that something similar is happening with you. Although on the opposite side. I don't think you can assume that yours is a LEFT on LEFT torsion though. You get left on right, right on left etc too.
Most of the population are like you - so problems on the left side. To do with right sided dominance apparently. But with most people it doesn't become symptomatic. But if you do a lot of sports with problems like this it's easy to see how joint problems will occure sooner or later. I was 'stuck' very obviously in this position for 8 years and in retrospect I realise it was developing for a decade or more before that (just not giving me problems). So mine was very hard to fix. Your twisting (assuming that this is indeed the cause of your problems) is not as apparent as mine, and only became symptomatic very recently. You would therefore hope yours would be easier to fix.
For starters I'd try doing that test very regularly as a stretch (holding for as long as possible on the tight side). These long, relaxed holds are good for stetching out shortened ligaments/tendons. Also with a friend try active release. So they push your knee down to it's end of range of motion and then you push against their hand - so an isometric contraction. Hold for a few seconds then relax and they should be able to push down a bit further. But also mobilisations are good - so just rolling your knees into the stretch position and back up - repeating maybe 20 times or so. You'll know pretty quickly whether it helps.
Now to make that work even better, try getting two tennis balls and taping them together with ducktape to make a kind of peanut shape. The idea being that the balls will dig in to the muscle either side of your spine, and the gap in the middle is where your spine goes. Lie on your back with the 'peanut' at the base of your spine and rock your knees from side to side, then tilt your pelvis - so you're trying to wiggle the bottom vertebrae in all directions to loosen off muscles, tendons and ligaments. Hang out for a few seconds on any sore spots and try and work through them. Then slide the peanut up to the next vertebrae and repeat. Do this all the way up to your neck. Then do the stretch and mobilisation described above. What this does is isolate all the little muscles and tendons between the vertebrae and forces them all to stretch out. When you just do one big stretch the tight bits tend to stay tight and the looser parts of your spine can over-stretch in order to compensate.
I hope this all makes sense. It's just something simple to try that *might* give you a clue as to whether you're on to something or not. I don't think you can do yourself any harm so it has to be worth a try.
Just to add, after doing this kind of stretch my groin discomfort and tightness would dissapear or ease off for a short while. It'd soon come back, but this proved to me that the source of the problem was the twist in the pelvis and not the hip joint. Once you know you're on the right track you can figure out more specific stuff to do.
alison84352 susan67756
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susan67756 alison84352
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Already it seems you've got a bit of nerve involvement. I too had quite severe nerve pain for a few months. My theory (and really it is just a guess) is that due to my twisted position the nerve had shortened. By stretching out the sacral torsion too quickly I irritated it the nerve. So be very vigilent for extra tingling etc and back off and take things more slowly if necessary!
zaire_70556 alison84352
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