Helen Hogan a 45 year old mother of 4 was a passenger in a b

Helen Hogan, a 45 year old mother of 4 was a passenger in a bus involved in an accident. When paramedics found her, she was lying in the aisle of the bus. On examination, they saw that her right thigh appeared shorter than her left thigh. They also noticed that even slight hip movement caused immense pain and that her thigh was flexed at the hip, adducted and medially rotated. In the ER, Helen was found by x-ray to have a dislocated hip and she was sedated to relax the muscles around her hips and the hip was popped back into place (a closed reduction). However a follow up x-ray showed that the reduction was not successful and Helen had to undergo surgery to complete the reduction.

Q1. Helen’s hipbone contains a hemispherical socket at the point where the femur attaches – Name this Structure. Name the three bones that fuse together within this structure.

Q2. Name the structure on the femur that acts like a ball that fits into the socket described in Q. 1.

Q.3 Helen’s injury is at the hip joint, but if you rested your hands on your hips you would not touch this structure, what structure in the pelvic girdle would you be touching?

Q 4. Joints are classified by structure and function – describe the joint involved in this situation both structurally and functionally. Include three distinguishing features that determine the structural classification of the joint.

Q6. Doctors note that ‘her thigh was flexed at the hip, adducted and medially rotated’. Describe what this means in terms of the position of her leg?

Q7. The doctor’s recommend that Helen is tested for osteoporosis. Define

osteoporosis, and explain, briefly, its effects on the body.

Solution

1)The structure is called as acetabulum and the three bones that make it are:ilium,pubis,ischium

2)That structure is called as a ball and socket joint where ball fits into a socket.

3)hip bones are the structures we are touching

4)The joint is ball and socket where the rounded head of the femur (ball) rests in the cup-like acetabulum (socket) of the pelvis

The three features are:

a)this joint is tough to break

b)The joint has a fluid that binds ball and socket

c)Dislocations can be easily solved by placing ball into the socket easily here.