Study: Periprosthetic joint infection negatively affects work status, quality of life
Click Here to Manage Email Alerts
Key takeaways:
- Periprosthetic joint infection was associated with difficulties performing everyday tasks and returning to work.
- 23% of patients with chronic infection said they regret their initial decision to undergo surgery.
Results showed patients who had periprosthetic joint infection after total joint arthroplasty may have difficulty performing everyday tasks and returning to work.
Researchers retrospectively reviewed 318 patients (mean age, 64 years) who had acute or chronic periprosthetic joint infection (PJI) after total hip or total knee arthroplasty, underwent revision TJA and had a minimum follow-up of 1 year.
Among the cohort, 39.6% of patients reported worse physical health; 38.5% reported worse quality of life; 35.3% reported worse social satisfaction; 25.2% reported worse mental health; and 20.5% said they were unable to negotiate stairs.
Patients with chronic PJI also reported an inability to complete daily physical activities, with 23% of patients saying they regret their initial decision to undergo TJA.
“This group of patients is prone to report challenges overcoming disability and returning to work,” the researchers wrote in the study.
“This finding crucially emphasizes how important patient education is in matching patients’ expectation to the burden of care required to treat chronic PJI,” they added.
Perspective
Back to Top
I commend the authors for this informative multicenter study evaluating quality of life and return to work status in patients who undergo surgery for PJI. As more joint replacements are being performed across the country, the importance of education and medical optimization to prevent infection has become increasingly important. The impact of PJI on a patient’s mental health is likely underestimated as well.
In this study, 318 patients were surveyed. Half of the patients with a knee PJI had to stop working and almost one-quarter were considered disabled. Patient-reported outcome measures also decreased, with one-third regretting undergoing their index surgery. However, if the infection was acute and only required debridement, antibiotics and implant retention, outcome scores were better. Similar trends were noted for the total hip PJI cohort. Patients with retained implants were more functional than patients with spacers.
Overall, about one-quarter of patients regretted undergoing joint replacement after having a PJI, and many were on disability. Increased focus should be paid to educating patients on the implications of PJI and the recovery period afterward. As patient-reported outcome measures are increasingly used for research and to assess pain and function, practices should facilitate access, offerings in multiple languages and emphasis on capture rate.
Collapse
Click Here to Manage Email Alerts