Top Tweets for #hipFractures

I've been an orthopedic surgeon for 30 years, and the most important part of falls is what happens long before the fall. People think a fall is bad luck. In my experience, it is usually the end of a long, awful, and quiet process. When the falls start... a lot of badness awaits in the near future. It looks like this: You walk a little less. You skip the stairs. You stop getting down on the floor and back up. Your legs get weaker, and your balance slows a little. One day a small stumble is too much for your body to catch. And so on... Hip fractures are among the most consequential events in all of medicine. 25% will die in a year. Most will never recover to where they were before the fracture. Many will not return home after healing. This is simply "getting old." It is far more. It comes from the quiet loss of capacity, and it happens when you stop asking your body to do things. You can train balance, leg strength, and the ability to get up from the floor at any age... don't call it training. Call it my anti-fall program, or I don't want to fear curbs or need to call a neighbor or 911 to help me get up. Don't wait for the falling to start. Keep your body in the habit of catching you. Don't think this could happen to you? Think again. Over 30 years, I've seen this happen to so many patients. It's such an awful problem... we have a capacity crisis, and we need to stop it.