Residual Groin Pain at a Minimum of Two Years After Metal-on-Metal THA with a Twenty-eight-Millimeter Femoral Head, THA with a Large-Diameter Femoral Head, and Hip Resurfacing

Background: Groin pain may persist in up to 4.3% of patients after total hip arthroplasty and up to 18% of patients one year after hip resurfacing. The incidence of this problem after total hip arthroplasty with a large-diameter femoral head is unknown.

Methods: We analyzed the natural history of groin pain and its clinical consequences during the first two years after three types of hip arthroplasty. Data were collected prospectively on 279 patients. Eighty-five patients had a polyethylene sandwich metal-on-metal total hip arthroplasty with a 28-mm-diameter femoral head, 105 had hip resurfacing, and eighty-nine had a total hip arthroplasty with a large-diameter femoral head component with three other cup designs (forty-nine in this group had the same monoblock acetabular cup design as those who had hip resurfacing).

Results: At the twenty-four-month follow-up evaluation, seventy-seven patients (28%) reported at least one painful area around the hip and thirty-four patients (12.2%) had pain at more than one location. At three months, the incidence of groin discomfort was significantly increased in those who had hip resurfacing (30.5%) and in those who had total hip arthroplasty with a large-diameter femoral head (30%) compared with those who had total hip arthroplasty with a 28-mm femoral head (18.3%). This incidence decreased at two years (14.9%, 16.9%, and 12.9%, respectively). At twenty-four months postoperatively, eleven (four who had hip resurfacing, six who had total hip arthroplasty with the large-diameter head, and one who had total hip arthroplasty with the 28-mm head) of forty-one patients who had groin pain had not reported groin pain at previous follow-up evaluations. Of the forty-one patients reporting groin pain at the time of the last follow-up, twenty-three patients (56%) did not seek further evaluation or treatment, nine had revision surgery (22%), and the remaining nine patients thought the pain was substantial enough to warrant further evaluation and treatment.

Conclusions: When the exact source of groin pain cannot be found after total hip arthroplasty, careful follow-up should be done as local reactions to metal-on-metal implants and component loosening may take time to become apparent clinically or on imaging studies.

Level of Evidence: Therapeutic Level III. See Instructions to Authors for a complete description of levels of evidence.