Failure of Screw/Shell Interface in the Trident II Acetabular System in Total Hip Arthroplasty

We report a case series of 2 patients with screw/shell interface failure in the Stryker Trident II Acetabular System. Both failures consisted of screw penetration through the Trident II acetabular shell. One failure was observed postoperatively after a revision from a cephalomedullary nail to a total hip arthroplasty while the other was observed intraoperatively during a primary total hip arthroplasty. Both component failures were managed conservatively with weight-bearing as tolerated and radiographic monitoring. These are the first reported cup/screw failures of the Stryker Trident II system and should raise awareness of the potential complication and implant design flaw. When placing acetabular screws, we recommend obtaining intraoperative orthogonal screw radiographs that are tangential to the shell surface to assess for screw/shell failure.