Do you wake up every night after a few hours of sleep, all drenched up, lying in the pool of water, asking yourself, “why am I sweating after my surgery?” Meet the hot flash: a common condition you encounter after hip replacement surgery.
Hot flashes after hip replacement surgery are common side effects that usually last for several weeks – often months. Remember, your body has undergone massive surgery and meeting some strange shifts, and side effects are usual during the recovery period.
In addition, hot flashes also occur due to several medications, especially anesthetics. The drug’s effect in your system increases the temperature that your body tries to cool down. That’s when you have hot flashes.
Let’s discuss more on hip replacement surgery and hot flashes.
What Is Hip Replacement Surgery?
Hip replacement is a surgical procedure of removing an injured or affected portion of your hip joint and replacing it with a prosthesis – the artificial joints. The primary reason for hip surgery is to get relief from the hip pain and stiffness that hip arthritis causes.
In addition, if you have a broken hip due to any injury or improperly grown hip, hip surgery helps a great deal. In short, when your hip, due to pain, stiffness, damage, or ineffectiveness, interferes with your everyday life, hip replacement surgery can restore your active and fully-functional hip.
Hip replacement surgery is of three types-
- Total hip replacement
- Partial hip replacement
- Hip resurfacing
However, total hip replacement surgery is the most common one where your doctor removes the damaged portion and replaces it with artificial implants – more likely metal, ceramic, or hard plastic.
Causes of Hip replacement Surgery
Your hip is the duel of ball and socket joint – the femoral head at the top of your femur and the acetabulum of your pelvis. It’s the swift movement of the ball that helps your leg rotate, letting you move forward, backward, and sideways.
The soft tissue covering the ball and the socket get damaged in the hip issues. As a result, your hip bones scrape together, become rough, and cause painful and restricted motion. This arthritis condition is osteoarthritis, the primary cause of hip surgery.
However, not all hip arthritis requires surgery; Nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs and physical therapy can improve the condition. However, consider and consult a physician for hip surgery if you face the followings-
- Severe pain that medications can not relief
- Pain interferes with your daily activities- work, walk, sleep, etc.
- Difficulty walking due to hip stiffness, restricting your motion
- Difficulty getting dressed
- Also, difficulty climbing stairs
- Trouble rising from a seated position
- Broken bones
What Is Hot Flash?
Hot flashes are the sudden feeling of heat or warmth in your upper body. Usually, you feel the intensity of heat over your face, neck, and chest. Often they accompany redness, sweating, and chilled afterward as you lose much body heat.
When hot flashes occur at night, making you wake up from sleep, drenched in wet sweat, it’s night sweats.
Hormones usually play a primary role in causing hot flashes. Usually, when your body encounters estrogen levels, it makes your body’s thermostat too sensitive to tiny changes in body temperature, so it initiates a chain of events to cool you down.
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Causes of Hot Flash
You typically encounter hot flashes as menopause symptoms or perimenopause symptoms. However, several other reasons can cause hot flashes that include-
- Thyroid issue
- Medications
- Surgery
- Cancer
- Side effects of cancer treatment
Do You Experience Hot Flashes After Hip Replacement Surgery?
Hot flash after hip replacement surgery is a common condition. Many often complain of waking up from sleep soaked and wet in sweat—several people need to change their clothes, bed covers due to the intensity of hot flashes.
Why does it happen?
Usually, you encounter hot flashes as a side effect of the major surgery you had gone through. Your body needs time to adjust to the new changes. Therefore, side effects like hot flashes and night sweats are pretty standard.
Another major cause of having hot flashes after hip replacement surgery is powerful medications, especially anesthetics.
Hot flashes and sweats are common side effects of the anesthetic. Your surgeon’s drug stays in your system for about 24 hours. It raises your body temperature, so your body tries to cool you down with sweating.
If you have only sweating after surgery but no fever, less likely it will turn into severity. It usually passes within a few days.
However, seek immediate attention if your night sweets and hot flashes incorporate other symptoms, days and weeks after the surgery. These symptoms may include-
- Fever – more than 101F
- Chills
- Foul smell
- Excessive wound discharge
- Greyish and cloudy wound discharge
- Excessive redness and swelling
For infections, doctors usually prescribe intravenous (IV) antibiotics for several weeks and monitor the effects of the medicine on you. Secondly, they will reopen your implanted area again to check for the infection.
Usually, they remove all the existing implants from your hip joints. Then clean the joint and the surrounding tissues. Finally, they place an artificial join temporarily till your infection heals.
How Can You Handle Hot Flashes After Hip Replacement Surgery
Hot flashes and night sweats are expected side effects after surgery. However, these effects usually leave on their own within a few days, often without medicines.
Nevertheless, if your hot flashes are frequently occurring with severity, you better consult your doctor. Moreover, if your chills and sweats accompany a fever, dizziness, etc., immediate medical is a priority. It may indicate an infection.
To deal with hot flashes after surgery, your doctor may prescribe you medications that include-
- Antidepressant
- Clonidine
- Anticonvulsants
- Oxybutynin
- Hormone replacement therapy, if your hot flashes occur due to hormonal imbalance
Tips To Handle Hot Flashes
Usually, hot flashes after hip surgery go away within a few days. However, to ease your life, you can consider lifestyle modification.
- Wear a dress in layers so you can remove them one by one
- Carry a fan to comfort you during a hot flash episode
- Avoid alcohol, caffeine, and spicy food
- Avoid smoke
- Lose weight
- Regular physical exercise and stress management
- Carry cool water
- Stay hydrated
- Keep yourself calm
Bottom Line
Hot flashes after hip replacement surgery are a common concern. It’s usually a side effect you encounter after the surgery – often due to high-dose medications. However, seek immediate medical attention if your sweats and hot flashes incorporate several additional symptoms such as fever, smell, and swelling.
My Concierge, MD, is a premier healthcare facility. The expert doctors and staff are always ready to serve with complete dedication, care, and support. The expert team will make your recovery period smoother, and you will feel yourself again shortly.
