Decades ago, total knee replacement was the standard if osteoarthritis had negatively impacted your knee and conservative treatments weren’t proving effective at managing symptoms. As time went on and surgical care improved, the partial knee replacement procedure grew in popularity. For patients with osteoarthritis in only one knee compartment, they could have that degenerative area replaced instead of the entire knee, leaving more of the healthy joint in place.
So while we’ve been able to tweak the standard procedure and preserve more healthy knee joint, does that partial replacement procedure actually produce better results than the total knee replacement operation? Researchers recently put that question to the test to see if partial or total knee replacement produced better outcomes.
Partial Vs. Total Knee Replacement Outcomes
To answer the question at the heart of this blog, researchers tracked the results of patients who underwent partial or total knee replacement surgery for a period of 10 years. 245 patients, with a mean age of 65, underwent partial knee replacement, while 270 participants had the total knee arthroplasty performed. Results were tracked at five years post op, but the study concluded after 10 years of observation and recovery tracking.
After looking at the data, researchers learned that both procedures produced very similar results. However, one operation performed slightly better than the other. According to researchers, the partial knee replacement procedure had slightly better outcomes than total knee replacement when it came to:
- Complications
- Overall health status in terms of quality-adjusted life-years
- Aggregate costs
Complication Rates
Researchers uncovered that the overall complication rate was 22% for patients undergoing partial knee replacement, and the complication rate for total knee replacement came in at 27%.
Quality-Adjusted Life-Years
Patients who underwent partial knee replacement saw an average gain of about four quality-adjusted life-months compared to total knee replacement patients.
Costs
The mean lower cost was about $950 for the partial knee replacement group, or less than $100 per year over the course of the 10 years of the study.
“This 10-year randomized controlled trial…provides the strongest, most robust evidence yet about the relative merits of TKR and PKR,” said David Beard, DPhil, GDPhys, MCSP, MSc, of the University of Oxford in England, and colleagues. “There were no significant differences between implants in clinical outcomes, reoperations, or revisions. However, the lower complication rate and the dominant health economic findings support continued recommendation of PKR.”
Now, this doesn’t mean that partial knee replacement is always the best course of treatment. Partial knee replacement is reserved for patients with degeneration in a specific knee compartment in an otherwise healthy knee. The majority of patients have more unilateral compartment degeneration, meaning total knee replacement is the best option for them. However, the findings of the study suggest that for the right patient, partial knee replacement may be just a little better fit than replacing the entire knee joint if other compartments are quite healthy.
If you’re interested in learning more about the health of your knees and which treatment may help you alleviate uncomfortable knee symptoms, reach out to Dr. Botero and his team today at (865) 558-4444.
