Disassembly and dislocation of a bipolar hip prosthesis.

Dislocation of a hip prosthesis is a common complication. In usual cases of hip prosthesis dislocation, the prosthetic femoral head comes out from either the natural acetabular cavity in a bipolar hemiarthroplasty or the prosthetic acetabulum in a total hip arthroplasty. Only a few cases of bipolar hip prosthesis dislocation due to dissociation between the polyethylene and inner head of the prosthesis have been reported. We describe a rare case of disassembly of the inner head from the bipolar outer prosthesis in an osteoarthritic acetabulum. A 72-year-old woman had undergone bipolar hemiarthroplasty due to fracture of the left femoral neck about 10 years previously. Recently, she sustained an injury after falling from a chair, and examinations revealed an unusual disassembly-dislocation of the bipolar hip prosthesis. We classified this failure in our patient as a type II failure, representing extreme varus position of the outer head in the acetabulum, dislocation of the inner head from the outer head, and a detached locking ring around the stem neck. This mechanism of failure as shown in our patient rarely occurs in the bipolar prosthesis of the self-centering system. Osteoarthritic change of the acetabulum would place the outer head in the varus position, increasing wear on the beveled rim by impinging the femoral stem neck and causing dislodgment of the inner locking ring and consequent disassembly-dislocation of the inner head.