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This morning in Health Watch, artificial hips, former President George Bush is resting at the Mayo clinic after a successful surgery to have his right hip replaced. He had his other hip replaced there 7 years ago. Dr. Joseph Zuckerman is chairman of the Department of Orthopedic surgery at New York University Hospital for joint diseases. Good morning.

Good morning, Julie.

Alright. Former president George Bush is 82 years old. Early word is that he is recovering well. Dose age matter when you’re having this type of surgery done?

Age is a factor, but it’s not the most important factor. You have to look at age in different ways. This chronological age. Your age, based upon the year you were born . My age I'm gonna be 55, but there is also physiological age. Sometime you can have somebody in their eighties who is physically fit, doesn’t have any medical problems, no high blood pressure or heart disease, and they really physiologically much younger. On the other hand, you can have a 55-year old who has heart disease, kidney problems, lung problems, has been a smoker that at really physiologically is much older.

So in that case, the eighty-year-old who’s healthy would be a better candidate who’s gonna recover faster?

Yes. I think that’s generally true.

All right. Show us what you brought in today cause this is an artificial hip. How does that get put into a patience’s body? What it is made of?

The hip is a ball and socket joint and the goal of a hip replacement surgery is to replace the worn-out ball and socket with artificial components. And hip replacement has been around for 40 years. And they have developed into, probably, the state of the art technology, now. And basically, hip replacements are comfortable. Although this example of hip replace was not the one necessarily that President Bush received. It’s similar in type and format. So, hip replacements consist of replacing the socket with a metal shell like this.

Yeah.

Right, so, it’s a shell that's hemispherical, the bone in the person is prepared, you know with different instruments. And then, this shell, this metal shell is inserted directly into the bone. And usually we’ll hold the shell in place, sometime you can increase the security of it with some screws.

and show us the long piece that you are holding.

Well, this piece here goes down the thigh bone right, the thigh bone is basically, you know, prepared by, \\ reaming out or cutting out the central portion. And this is now placed into the bone. Sometimes it’s segmented to place .

Alright. We only got 30 seconds left. Having said all this about 200,000 Americans get this done every year. It takes about 1.5 hours to 2 hours. What’s the recovery process like?

The recovery process is a fairly quick one. Patients are up sometime the same day. Usually the day after surgery, they start their rehabilitation program. After 3, 4 or 5 days in the hospital, they’ll be discharged. They continue their rehabilitation program at home. And usually, (for how many months) well. Usually I’d say by the time that 6 weeks after the surgery they (are) getting around pretty well. Right, and it within 2 or 3 monthes they're finished.

Dr. Joseph Zuckerman. Thank you so much for explain that to us.

You’re welcome, Julie.
And for more on hip replacement and the latest procedures go to our partner in health coverage webmd.com and search hip replacement.