Ronan’s hips were checked as part of our discharge from hospital when he was born, the midwife who carried out the checks wasn’t happy with his hips and called for an opinion from a pediatrician. The pediatrician came and then told us that his hip was ‘clicky’ and that there wasn’t necessarily anything wrong and that we would be referred for a follow up check when he was 6-8 weeks old. The midwife who carried out the original check was not at all happy when she was told what the doctor had told us, and so she asked for a second opinion from a more senior pediatrician. This time we were told his hips were ‘clunky’, the doctor could dislocate the hip and treatment would definitely be required.His hips were scanned by ultrasound when he was a week old and he was put into the pavlik harness at 2 weeks old.
I was distraught at seeing my tiny baby in the harness, and it took him a little while to get used to it. At one of our follow up checks we were told there was a possibility of the harness coming off when he was 8 weeks old, I was so excited about this possibility and was then massively disappointed when he had to stay in it for a further 6 weeks, I really wish they’d said nothing about the chance of getting it off early, I really don’t think the doctors realised just how much we pinned our hopes on that throwaway comment!
Now looking back I am hugely thankful for that midwife in hospital, even though there had been family history, I didn’t really know anything about baby hip problems and if it wasn’t for that midwife it is possible Ronan’s hip may have gone undetected. At the time lots of people told me it was great that it had been picked up and that he was getting treatment so early. Looking back now rationally I know it was, but at the time I just wanted to shout at people that there was nothing great about the fact that my newborn needed to be in a harness! I won’t lie I shed many tears, and we did take a while to adjust but I now have a happy and healthy toddler running around, no one would ever suspect he’d had a problem!