129 Area of pain presentation in hip arthroscopy patients

Abstract

Introduction: Hip arthroscopy is becoming a more common procedure in sports and musculoskeletal medicine. It is common practice for clinicians to use the location of pain in diagnosing potential source(s) of pathology. There is a dearth of literature detailing the area of pain of hip arthroscopy patients. Methodology: Patients undergoing hip arthroscopy were recruited from three orthopaedic surgeons and two sports medicine practices in Melbourne. 100 consenting patients were given a questionnaire with 9 possible sites of pain. Each patient was asked to rate their average pain for the preceding week for each of the 9 sites using a visual analogue scale (0 = no pain to 10 = worst possible). The questionnaire was anonymously returned to the research,assistant. This data was then collated and analysed to determine the area of pain that patients commonly describe when presenting with internal hip pathology. Within that group there was a cohort of 30 subjects that had their operative findings recorded (as part of another study). This group is separately discussed. Result and conclusions: (final data analysis incomplete) Groin pain is a common finding in patients presenting with hip pathology, however pain in the buttock and lower back regions also were common presentations. The result of our paper has clinical implications for practitioners managing patients presenting with any back/pelvis/thigh or leg pain. The cohort of 30 was too small to establish if different types of hip pathology presents with on different areas of pain.