Quantification of assembly forces during creation of head-neck taper junction considering soft tissue bearing: a...

All current total hip arthroplasty (THA) systems are modular in design. Only during the operation femoral head and stem get connected by a Morse taper junction. The junction is realized by hammer blows from the surgeon. Decisive for the junction strength is the maximum force acting once in the direction of the neck axis, which is mainly influenced by the applied impulse and surrounding soft tissues. This leads to large differences in assembly forces between the surgeries. This study aimed to quantify the assembly forces of different surgeons under influence of surrounding soft tissue.

First, a measuring system, consisting of a prosthesis and a hammer, was developed. Both components are equipped with a piezoelectric force sensor. Initially, in situ experiments on human cadavers were carried out using this system in order to determine the actual assembly forces and to characterize the influence of human soft tissues. Afterwards, an in vitro model in the form of an artificial femur (Sawbones Europe AB, Malmo, Sweden) with implanted measuring stem embedded in gelatine was developed. The gelatine mixture was chosen in such a way that assembly forces applied to the model corresponded to those in situ. A study involving 31 surgeons was carried out on the aforementioned in vitro model, in which the assembly forces were determined.

A model was developed, with the influence of human soft tissues being taken into account. The assembly forces measured on the in vitro model were, on average, 2037.2 N ± 724.9 N, ranging from 822.5 N to 3835.2 N. The comparison among the surgeons showed no significant differences in sex (P = 0.09), work experience (P = 0.71) and number of THAs performed per year (P = 0.69).

All measured assembly forces were below 4 kN, which is recommended in the literature. This could lead to increased corrosion following fretting in the head-neck interface. In addition, there was a very wide range of assembly forces among the surgeons, although other influencing factors such as different implant sizes or materials were not taken into account. To ensure optimal assembly force, the impaction should be standardized, e.g., by using an appropriate surgical instrument.