BACKGROUND: Although hip osteoarthritis is a common disabling condition,an incomplete understanding of all factors that contribute to hip osteoarthritis disability persists.The objective of the study was to improve our understanding of potentially preventable factors that mightinfluence hip osteoarthritis disability by examining the prevalence and impact of selected comorbid factorspotentially associated with the progression and severity of hip joint osteoarthritis among patients withend-stage hip osteoarthritis. MATERIAL/METHODS: The medical records of 1,000 hip osteoarthritis surgicalpatients were assessed to specifically identify the presence or absence of comorbid conditions of thecardiac, vascular or respiratory systems. The association between the patient's functional status beforeand after surgery, and the presence or absence of these comorbid conditions, was assessed. RESULTS: Over55% of the sample had at least one comorbid condition, such as hypertension or cardiac disease. Aftercontrolling for age, trauma, type of surgery and gender discrepancies, those with two or more comorbiditieswere found to have greater degrees of functional impairment before surgery, and lower post-operativefunctional status after surgery than those with no co-existent disease (p<0.05).
Conclusions: Patients with end-stage hip osteoarthritis exhibit a high prevalence of vascular-related comorbidities. The disability of patients with hip osteoarthritis is increased in the presence of two or more related comorbid conditions. These findings suggest a novel focus for primary, secondary and tertiary preventive strategies.

Keywords: Aged, 80 and over, Comorbidity, Diabetes Mellitus, Hypertension, Neoplasms, New York City, Obesity, Osteoarthritis, Hip, Prevalence, Respiration Disorders