AJRR releases annual report for patients about hip, knee replacement surgery

The American Joint Replacement Registry announced it has published the 2016 Report to the Public About Hip and Knee Replacements, which is a patient summary of clinical data found in its annual report.

“Spearheaded by members of our public advisory board, this report was developed to share what we are learning about hip and knee replacement surgery in the United States,” Daniel J. Berry, MD, chair of the board of the directors for the American Joint Replacement Registry (AJRR), said in a press release. “We are proud to publish and release this report so patients can better understand how that information is being used to continually improve the quality of their care.”

According to the report, the AJRR found a significant increase in the use of ceramic femoral heads, with a higher percentage of ceramic heads being used for younger patients compared with older patients. The report also noted a “marginally significant increase” in the percentage of total hip arthroplasties performed for femoral neck fractures vs. hemiarthroplasty from 2012 to 2015. During the same period, the use of modular neck stems decreased while the use of dual mobility liners increased, according to the report.

In addition, the report showed a slight downward trend in the use of unicompartmental knee implants. Approximately 30% of surgeons reported performing unicompartmental arthroplasty in 2015, while patellofemoral arthroplasty represented less than 1% of knee arthroplasties.

The report noted a significant increase in the use of antioxidant polyethylene acetabular liners from 2012 to 2015 for both the hip and knee data. The AJRR also noted a revision burden of 10.2% among hips and of 8.7% among knees, which was consistent with the values reported for other large national registries.

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