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Why Do Lateral Unicompartmental Knee Arthroplasties Fail Today?
Jelle P van der List1, Hendrik A Zuiderbaan, Andrew D Pearle
1Hospital for Special Surgery, New York, NY. vanderlistj@hss.edu.
American Journal of Orthopedics (Belle Mead, N.J.)
|December 23, 2016
Summary
Progression of osteoarthritis is the most frequent failure mode in lateral unicompartmental knee arthroplasty (UKA). Future studies should analyze lateral UKA failure modes separately from medial UKA for clearer insights.
Area of Science:
- Orthopedic Surgery
- Biomedical Engineering
- Clinical Research
Background:
- Lateral unicompartmental knee arthroplasty (UKA) failure modes are often grouped with medial UKA, despite anatomical and kinematic differences.
- This combined reporting obscures specific failure patterns unique to lateral UKA due to its lower surgical frequency.
Purpose of the Study:
- To systematically review and assess the failure modes of lateral UKA.
- To compare failure modes reported in cohort studies versus registry-based studies.
Main Methods:
- A systematic literature search was conducted across PubMed, Embase, and Cochrane databases.
- Twenty-five studies (23 cohort, 2 registry-based) reporting lateral UKA failure modes were included.
Main Results:
- The most common failure modes in lateral UKA overall were progression of osteoarthritis (29%), aseptic loosening (23%), and bearing dislocation (10%).
- Cohort studies indicated progression of osteoarthritis (36%) as the primary failure mode, whereas registry studies identified aseptic loosening (28%) as most common.
- Significant differences in the reported prevalence of failure modes were observed between cohort and registry-based studies.
Conclusions:
- Progression of osteoarthritis is the predominant failure mode in lateral UKA.
- Separate reporting of failure modes for medial and lateral UKA is crucial in future cohort and registry-based studies to improve understanding and surgical outcomes.
