Woman's hip replacement disintegrates, causing metal poisoning(arstechnica.com)
39 pointsby Qem9 hours ago4 comments
  • potamic2 hours ago
    I wonder if the same can happen from dental implants. While not subject to the same levels of mechanical stress, the mouth can be a very acidic environment which can be corrosive to metals.
  • golem148 hours ago
    Ouch! I must say, she got lucky they diagnosed the cobalt poisoning in time.
  • vivzkestrel5 hours ago
    - stupid question

    - what set of conditions actually cause a person to get a hip replacement surgery apart from an accident?

    • bigbaguette4 hours ago
      Arthritis. Causes heaps of pain and reduced mobility which brings a whole lot of other medical complications. Hips replacement are super common past a certain age.
      • wildzzz4 hours ago
        Osteoarthritis (or specifically, osteoarthrosis), not rheumatoid arthritis (swelling of the areas around the joint due to immunoresponse), it's when the cartilage on the femural head wears out so its just bone on bone. Doctors can inject hyaluronic acid for temporary lubrication but a replacement is pretty much the only long term treatment.
    • jdlshore4 hours ago
      Age. Hip replacement surgery is common among the elderly.
      • crote3 hours ago
        She had a hip replacement at age 37. That's not due to age.
        • Someone3 hours ago
          The question (“what set of conditions actually cause a person to get a hip replacement surgery apart from an accident?”) wasn’t about her case. The article clearly indicates she had an accident (“Twenty years before, she had a hip replacement that stemmed from an injury she sustained in a car crash ten years before that”)
  • ButlerianJihad7 hours ago
    I do not know who these Very Important Patients are, what sort of insurance they carry, what their social-credit ratings are, or what sort of providers they see, but this article reads to me like an episode of “House MD” or “Doc Martin”.

    I can only vouch for my personal lived experience, as a mentally ill man living in poverty, on Medicaid and ACA plans. No provider would ever in a million years do this kind of diligence for any condition. Not in the Emergency Department for sure . They run standard tests: every test that insurance will pay for, every test that my credit rating will bear, and then they slap on the most common treatments and try to get me outta there ASAP.

    I’ve long had alleged thyroid issues and alleged organ troubles that can be wicked mimics of myriad conditions, and Levothyroxine (Synthroid) in particular can engender some horrific psychiatric symptoms.

    So bravo to the genius providers who evidently needed to apply for grants and/or needed to get monographs published in the JAMA, so much so that they went to considerable and unnecessary expense to figure out this lady’s issues.

    • manarthan hour ago
      It's a common and well-known consequence of hip replacements.

      This paper from 2015 describes a similar case (quickly identified via X-ray by the deformation of the metal structure)

          "It has been well established in the literature that revision of a fractured ceramic total hip replacement with metallic components can result in metallosis. Several authors have reported symptomatic cobalt toxicity after revision of a failed ceramic head component to a metal-on-polyethylene articulation"
      https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC4958112/
    • kirykl5 hours ago
      There actually was an episode of House with this very diagnosis from a hip replacement, https://house.fandom.com/wiki/Family_Practice
      • camgunzan hour ago
        My hottest policy take is that all physicians have to watch House all the way through.
      • tefkahan hour ago
        lmao the reason he finally figured it out was because she didn't understand him sarcasm, so he figured she must have neurological issues? classic
    • mindslight4 hours ago
      I share your cynicism based on my own experiences, but I think the technical answer to your question includes:

      1. We don't know how many people had similar conditions that simply went untreated.

      2. If you somehow manage to pique a doctor's curiosity, they might apply a similar effort for you.