Arthroscopic Management of Recurrent Low-Energy Anterior Hip Dislocation in a Dancer A Case Report and Review of Literature

Anterior hip dislocations are relatively rare injuries, occurring in approximately 9% of hip dislocations, and are historically associated with high-energy mechanisms involving an external force placed on the hip joint, such as that by motor vehicle accidents (including passengers and pedestrians), falls, and contact sports.(4,16) These injuries are initially treated with urgent reduction, preferably closed, in an attempt to prevent osteonecrosis. Patients infrequently go on to develop recurrent anterior hip dislocation that often necessitates operative treatment. Four cases of recurrent anterior hip dislocation in young healthy patients have been reported in the English literature and have been associated with anterior capsular redundancy.(5,10,12,17) Treatment options have included open capsulorrhaphy and either intertrochanteric derotational osteotomy or subtrochanteric femoral derotational osteotomy via an anterolateral approach.(10,17) In one report, a failed subtrochanteric femoral derotational osteotomy was successfully treated with a periacetabular osteotomy.(17) Only one previous report of a documented low-energy anterior hip dislocation has been found in the literature, occurring in a dancer and treated with open reduction.(14) We report on the second case of low-energy anterior hip dislocation and the first known case with recurrent episodes of low-energy anterior hip dislocation. Our patient was also a dancer and was successfully treated with arthroscopic surgery.