Jul 30, 2008 9:01 am US/Eastern
HealthWatch: The Danger Of Ignoring 'Growing Pain'
NEW YORK (CBS) ―
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Doctors look at a screen showing a hip impingement, a common condition often misdiagnosed as "growing pains."
CBS
Growing pains are a bit of a misnomer since there's no evidence that growth actually causes the pain in the leg that's usually associated with "growing pains."
It's most common between ages 2 and 12 and is probably due to muscle overuse when kids are extra active, and will go away on their own. But what if it's not growing pains?
Justine Miano has had pain her hips for years…really serious pain.
"It was excruciating. It always felt like it was stuck in place," said Miano.
Interestingly, Justine's older brother, Michael, also suffered from severe hip pain, and both of them were told it was the same thing.
"It was dismissed as growing pains, something I would come out of, it was just a condition," said Michael.
But it turns out that those growing pains were something altogether different. Both Justine and Michael had something called hip impingement.
"Hip impingement means when the hip is put through range of motion, the bones actually collide earlier than they should. The soft tissues get damaged, the labrum, which is the rim of the socket, it gets damaged and torn, and then in the later stages the cartilage, the actual lining of the joint, starts getting damaged," said Dr. Robert Buly of the Hospital for Special Surgery.
A 3-D reconstruction of Michael's hip shows what it looks like when he flexes his hips; there's an extra ridge of bone that collides with the hip socket. The red area is what had to be shaved away, which doctors were able to do minimally invasively.
Justine's impingement was more serious and required realigning the head of the hip with hardware to hold it in place.
Justine still needs her other hip done however. The idea is to correct the problem before it becomes serious arthritis and requires a total hip replacement.
Michael knows that would have meant several hip replacements over his lifetime.
"I'm relieved and excited to get this sort of taken care of so the problem isn't dragging along into my 20's," said Michael.
So if growing pains are sometimes something more serious, how can parents tell the difference?
"Pain that doesn't go away, pain that seems to be out of proportion to what kids usually get. And especially if the pain is persistent and associated with other signs like lack of rotation, lack of normal range of motion," said Dr. Buly.
The point is that while most growing pains will go away on their own, if it is something more serious, you want to get it treated to prevent early arthritis of the joint. Again, it's not all that common but you certainly want to avoid joint replacement if possible. Justine and Michael will be having their other hips done over the Christmas holidays.
(© MMIX, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved.)
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