More young men are suffering from arthritis

A word of warning for the gentlemen out there. More and more men are experiencing aches and pains that were once primarily associated with older age. Doctors at the University of Connecticut Health Center say “young” arthritis is a growing health concern.

Until recently, just walking up the stairs was a painful obstacle for attorney Scott Jelescheff. He had a health problem he never would have expected to encounter in his late thirties.

“I had been involved in restoring an old motorcycle, and while I was getting it tuned properly, I was doing a lot of kick starting and I started feeling a sharp pain in my hip,“ he said.

The pain was a form of early arthritis caused by a condition called femoroacetabular impingement or FAI.

It’s basically too much friction in the hip joint.

“I was having trouble walking,“ said Jelescheff. “I stopped walking my dogs. I dreaded stairs.“

“This is a relatively new diagnosis or a new evolution of arthritis that we didn’t know occurred,“ said Dr. Michael Meneghini, an orthopedic surgeon at UCONN Health Center. “And we’re now recognizing arthritis years before it happens in a pre-arthritic state if you will.“

Dr. Meneghini said he’s seen men as young as their early twenties come in with symptoms. “The patients will present with pain some times flexing their hip—sometimes going up and down stairs—sometimes squatting down playing with their kids. Those kinds of activities they’ll notice they’ll get pain in their groin or pain in the outside of their hip.“

Jelescheff was a new father when the pain started, and worried about the impact it would have on his relationship with his son. “I lost the ability to bounce him and up and down to comfort him, and I was concerned as he was beginning his walking career, my walking career was going to be ending.“

He knew he had to take action. So he went to see Dr. Menghini. 

Sometimes cortisone injections can relieve the pain. But in Jelescheff’s case, surgery was the best option.

He says the recovery was tough ... but well worth it. “It happened at a point in my life where I’ve got a lot of future plans,“ he said. “And a lot of my future plans involved walking and other physical activities, so I couldn’t let it go on any longer.“

Now nearly pain-free, he’s able to focus on his son’s walking ... not his own.