Hip Pain

What is Hip Pain?

Hips are made up of two ball and socket joints that fit together in a way to withstand a lot of wear and tear, with a cushion of cartilage inside that allows for fluid movement. The cartilage helps prevent friction as the hip bone moves in its socket, but with time tends to wear down or become damaged.

Muscles and tendons attached to the hip may also get torn, stretched or overused. The hip bone itself could also be fractured during a fall or injury. When this happens, individuals might experience serious hip pain, which leads to the inability to walk properly or move freely.

Symptoms of Hip Pain

Symptoms of hip pain range from pain in the hip to pain radiating down the thigh to the knee and sometimes as far as the ankle.

Depending on the condition causing your pain, you might even feel discomfort outside of the hip joint, the groin, inside of the hip joint, and thighs.

What are the Causes of Hip Pain?

The causes of hip pain are many, which may also include improper posture while walking. However, some of the most common are:

• Arthritis – An age-related condition that results in the degeneration of your hip bone. The severity of your arthritic-related pain depends on the severity of degeneration. However, early treatment and intervention can prevent hip area pain from arising.
• Labral Tear – A cartilaginous tear of the labrum (often seen in athletes) may results in aching pain, at times sharp pain, or the popping of the hip joint.
• Capsulitis – Tightness and inflammation to the sac surrounding your hip joint. This tightness affects the range of movement in your hip, which may result in chronic pain in the buttock region.
• Contusions – Often referred to as bruises, contusions are the result of a blunt trauma that is commonly experienced while playing contact sports. In this case, contusions in the hip area could lead to considerable amounts of pain in the hips and surrounding muscles.
• Groin Strain – A strain in the groin muscle could affect the stability of the hip joint and result in excess strain being placed on the inner side of the hip joint, which leads to serious pain in the hip area.

What are Some of the Approaches to Pain Relief?

Until you have found the underlying cause of your pain, long term resolution of symptoms will not be found. Once the diagnosis has been made, relief should in most cases be effective. If your hip pain is caused by arthritis, tendinitis, or muscle/tendon strain, relief can be achieved via over-the-counter prescription medication, such Tylenol or anti-inflammatory drugs like Aleve or Motrin.

Possible treatments with the top pain management doctors in Chicago include cortisone injections, TENS units, and possibly regenerative medicine treatments such as PRP therapy and stem cell procedures.