Study: Intraoperative imaging is cost-effective for THA procedures
According to published results, intraoperative fluoroscopy and flat plate radiographs are cost-effective options for surgeons performing total hip arthroplasty.
Gregory J. Kirchner, MD, MPH, and colleagues from Penn State Milton S. Hershey Medical Center performed a break-even analysis to determine if the improvements in component positioning provided by intraoperative imaging are worth the extra cost during THA. Variables influencing cost-effectiveness included cost of imaging, rate of revision surgery and cost of revision surgery. Absolute risk reduction (ARR) for cost-effectiveness was calculated by the difference between the initial revision rate and the final revision rate, according to the release.
Intraoperative fluoroscopy, which averaged $194 and an additional 4 minutes, was determined to be cost-effective if the rate of revision due to component mispositioning (0.62%) was reduced by an ARR of 0.25%. Similarly, intraoperative flat plate radiographs, which averaged $201 and an additional 4 minutes, were determined to be cost-effective if the rate of revision due to component mispositioning was reduced by an ARR of 0.26%.
“Cost-effectiveness is achieved with lower ARR in the setting of lower imaging costs ($15, ARR 0.02%), and higher ARR with higher imaging costs ($225, ARR 0.29%),” Kirchner and colleagues wrote in the study. “At current revision rates for component malpositioning, only one revision among 400 THAs needs to be prevented for the utilization of fluoroscopy (or one in 385 THAs with flat plate imaging), to achieve cost-effectiveness,” they added.
Collapse
Read more about