Birmingham Hip Resurfacing Replacement

Only young male patients (<60) may be suitable for this type of replacement.

The advantage for the young male is that it may allow the patient to do more robust type sports like regular jogging, touch football, social soccer and generally higher impact sports. It is still a replacement and patients need to be aware that it cannot behave and feel like a normal joint and rarely it may still result in complications due to metal on metal surfaces such as metal allergy, fluid build-up and in rare cases soft tissue damage.

Please note that the Birmingham hip resurfacing, BHR, is the gold standard of hip resurfacing implants and is NOT the same resurfacing as the ASR prosthesis made by Depuy Johnson & Johnson. The DePuy ASR was withdrawn from production over 7 years ago and that has been linked to major adverse outcomes.

The BHR is manufactured by Smith & Nephew. The cumulative percent revision at 20 years for the BHR is 7.7%

Surgery is done through the posterior approach. There are more internal muscle releases in order to preserve the femoral head and patients may bruise a little more and initially be more uncomfortable than a standard total hip.

Birmingham Hip Resurfacing Replacement vs Conventional Hip Replacement