After shoulder arthroplasty, patients can expect to return to racket sports
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LAS VEGAS — A study that specifically looked at return to racket sports, not sports in general, in patients who underwent anatomic total shoulder or reverse shoulder arthroplasty showed a 79% return to racket sports by 12-month follow-up.
Furthermore, “Overall self-perceived sport performance following surgery stayed the same or improved in 82% of the patients,” according to the abstract of the study by Jonathan C. Levy, MD, at Levy Shoulder Center, and colleagues.
The results were presented at the American Academy of Orthopaedic Surgeons Annual Meeting.
Levy told Healio, “I’ve submitted papers and posters to the academy for about 15 years, and this is the most attention I’ve gotten for any of my work. So that’s great,” he said of this study and another he and his colleagues did that focused on return to playing golf.
For this study, Levy and colleagues gave 43 patients who identified as playing recreational racket sports, such as tennis and pickleball, prior to undergoing anatomic TSA or RSA a questionnaire to complete that addressed their experience with return to playing racket sports.
Results showed that of the 26 patients with TSAs and 17 patients with RSAs, four patients noted they were unable to return to a racket sport due to a shoulder complaint.
Among the 39 patients who were able to play, return to play was possible at 6 months for 18 patients and at 12 months for 31 patients.
The impetus of the study, Levy said, was his internal bias, “that it would be more difficult to play tennis if you had a reverse shoulder replacement and, actually, the results of the study were the opposite. [There was] pretty equal ability to return to all various aspects of tennis — forehand, backhand, serves, enjoyment of the sport — with high numbers.”
Results also showed a significant improvement in pain during racket sports play, with median VAS pain scores that improved from 6.8 to 1.3, and there was no difference in that improvement in pain between patients who underwent TSA and patients who underwent RSA.
Putting that finding into perspective, “[VAS score of] 1 out of 10 — pain of 1, while playing, is good. Most have a VAS of 1 while playing sports whether they had a shoulder replacement or not,” Levy said.
“The bottom line is patients interested in returning to racket sports after shoulder replacement can do so predictably and reliably. So, I no longer hesitate to offer a shoulder replacement to a racket sports player who wants to get back to sports,” he said.
Editor’s Note: This article was updated on March 10, 2023, to change Dr. Levy’s affiliation.
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Vegas A, et al. Poster 798. Presented at: American Academy of Orthopaedic Surgeons Annual Meeting; March 7-11, 2023; Las Vegas.
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