What Is A Hip Replacement Made Of?

Transcript of VIdeo:

What is a hip replacement made of? Hello, I'm Dr. Dan Albright with Raleigh Orthopedics.

I get that question a lot from patients. What are you going to put in my body? Am I going to be allergic to it? What is it made of?

The answer is titanium - a common metal used in hip replacements and cobalt chrome.

I have some examples here. This would be an example of a femoral stem. This stem is titanium - no glue, no cement. Usually, we avoid cement these days. This would be a ceramic ball - a little more expensive, a little smoother, a little harder than metal. Both are used - metal balls, ceramic balls. There's an example of a metal ball right here - a cobalt chrome. This is a cemented stem - glued in, cement. We still use it typically in older patients - 90-years-old, 80-years-old. In the United States, we've moved away from cement in recent years, but cement still plays a role, a good role, in hip replacement surgery.

Here is a hip replacement model. Here's a ceramic ball. This is the socket with plastic, highly cross-linked polyethylene plastic. This plastic has gotten much better in recent decades. Plastic use to be the weak link in hips. The plastic used to cause the failure of most hip replacements, but the plastic now is really good.

You can use a ceramics liner for the socket. You can use a metal liner - that's gone out of favor.

So those are the summary of materials - titanium and cobalt chrome for the stem and metal socket, plastic liner. You have a ball that can be made out of ceramic or cobalt chrome.

If you have more questions about that or want to talk about your hip pain or arthritis, I'm happy to see you at any time. For a second opinion, for a consult, please call our appointments line. Thanks.

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It’s very helpful to know what the artificial joint is made for. I encourage you to create more detailed and informative videos.

[sheaves]

I had metal on metal hip replacement surgery in 2005. I've had to have both of those hip replacements revised due to large amount of cobalt and chromium ions in my blood (which have caused other issues). I now have a ceramic ball and a plastic liner (no more cobalt chromium). Hopefully those large amounts of metal ions will decrease over time.