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Updated: May 17, 2026

Novel Diagnostics in Revision Arthroplasty: Implant Sonication and Multiplex Polymerase Chain Reaction
Published on: December 3, 2017
Sonication versus vortexing of implants for diagnosis of prosthetic joint infection
María Eugenia Portillo1, Margarita Salvadó, Andrej Trampuz
1Microbiology Laboratory, Reference Laboratory of Catalunya, Barcelona, Spain. eportillo@lrc.es.
Abstract:
Biofilm removal efficacy of vortexing alone was compared with the standard vortexing-sonication procedure. Among 135 removed prostheses, 35 were diagnosed with infection and 100 with aseptic failure. At a cutoff of ≥ 50 CFU/ml, sonication was more sensitive than vortexing (60% versus 40%, P = 0.151), while the specificity was 99% for both methods.
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