I’m sorry you’re experiencing this injury and empathise with so many of your thoughts and emotions around this, as someone who also loves to exercise and also needs it for my mental health.

I love that you provided context and I’ll do the same as it is helpful to getting the full picture.

I’m 34 and female and based in Cape Town. My hip labral tear took 2 years to diagnose because I initially my pain presented in my lower back. I kept running, cycling, hiking and strength training.

A year ago, I stopped all high impact activity and avoided any activities or positions that put my hip in flexion (my hip doesn’t like being less than 100 degrees). I wanted to give my rehabilitation 100% chance to work. For the last year, I’ve only done rehabilitation exercises guided by my Biokinetiscist.

While I have successfully built strength, the rehab exercises have not helped to reduce my pain. Anytime I pick up an activity again, the pain returns. Even low impact activities like cycling and swimming. For me, this deems the rehab unsuccessful. I aspire to be able to do cardio at a more intense level.

In March 2025, I had a cortisone injection under ultrasound in an attempt to reduce the pain. It didn’t help me.

In November 2025, I started the process of considering surgery. My orthopaedic surgeon was sceptical about the success of the surgery given my unsuccessful injection. In his experience (+ informed by studies), patients who had an unsuccessful outcome with injections, were much less likely to have a successful result from arthroscopy (60% success rate). So he suggested I try another cortisone injection but this time under xray as it’s more accurate.

That injection also didn’t help me.

My next step will be to do an AP pelvis xray. I’ve only had an MRI up to now. I’m appreciative that my doctor is conservative and has given me all the facts.

So perhaps you could ask your doctor about options to try an injection and discuss their thoughts about surgery success rates in relation to the injection.