Ball and socket artificial hip joint - has metal carbide layer on ball part fitting into carbon fibre reinforced socket

摘要

The artificial hip joint as in the main patent has a ball end (12) mounted on the end of a stem (13) inserted in the femur. This carries a layer (20) of low friction material which fits inside the socket position (11). This material is either silicon carbide, silicon nitride, borium nitride or aluminium oxide or of mixtures of oxides or zirconium oxide. The ball portion consists of a cobalt/chromium/molybedenum alloy. The socket (111) is made of carbon fibre reinforced plastics material. The stem can be made of a bio-compatible metal or carbon fibre reinforced graphite, and has an end (17) of reduced size, fitting into the ball end (12).