[Post surgical ossifications (total prosthesis) of the hips in subjects suffering from vertebral ankylosing hyperostosis].

In a series of 67 patients suffering from vertebral ankylosing hyperostosis (VAH) and who underwent surgery in one or both hips (93) with installing of a prosthesis, we observed in all the subjects post-surgical coxal ossifications, and in 57 of them, large or very large ossifications. These ossifications appeared solely during the first year following surgery, and their final volume was reached during this first year. The appearance of such post-surgical coxal ossifications during the VAH is for us a characteristic of the disease. This observation is a factor that points to a general and non local (vertebral) mechanism of the VAH.