In the beginning

My mother had a total hip replacement (THR) 20 years ago, at age 50, just after my dad had died of a brain tumour. She would say, ‘at least this hip problem is not life threatening’. After mum’s joint replacement surgery, I saw her live life to the full—including jet-skiing, tandem paragliding! Her replaced hip (the early small-headed Charnley prosthesis) is still doing great. As a young physiotherapist, I wanted to learn all I could to help mum’s hip stand the test of time and that is where my journey started as a hip specialist physiotherapist in the UK.

My first time as a hip patient was in 2011, after 20 years of treating hip patients (figure 1). I had an accident slipping on some ice and badly tore my left hip labral cartilage. I underwent a hip arthroscopy which after 9 months of tailored graded rehabilitation successfully relieved my pain, muscle inhibition and joint stiffness—it gave me my life back.

Having a hip injury and recovering from the hip arthroscopy gave me valuable insight into how having hip pain can affect you physically and mentally, and how addressing both aspects is equally important.1 My experience really helped me understand my patients better; some of my colleagues and patients joked that I had it done as a …