Patient Satisfaction, Functional Outcomes, and Implant Survivorship in Patients Undergoing Customized Unicompartmental Knee Arthroplasty

Patient Satisfaction Following Unicompartmental Knee Arthroplasty: Current Concepts

Unicompartmental knee arthroplasty (UKA) has gained progressive popularity in recent decades, currently comprising approximately 10% of knee arthroplasties in the United States. Nonetheless, UKA has not yet solidified its position as the superior treatment for isolated compartment osteoarthritis, as initial reported implant survivorship was subpar, leading to hesitation in its utilization and stricter patient indications compared to total knee arthroplasty. Patient satisfaction following knee arthroplasty has emerged as a critical metric to gauge patient acceptance and contentment with surgical interventions. Currently, a variety of UKA types exist, differing in bearing design, fixation techniques such as cementless or cemented fixation, and robotic-assisted systems, each with its own merits and drawbacks. Multiple studies have demonstrated the contributions of these innovations to improve clinical outcomes and implant survivorship. However, the abundance of studies has made it challenging to establish a clear overview. This paper provides an overview of the current concepts of UKA, evaluating various aspects of UKA referencing to patient satisfaction and providing a recap of its historical development. Available research demonstrated no significantly universal superior variant of UKA.

Bone Regeneration Induced by Patient-Adapted Mg Alloy-Based Scaffolds for Bone Defects: Present and Future Perspectives

Treatment of bone defects resulting after tumor surgeries, accidents, or non-unions is an actual problem linked to morbidity and the necessity of a second surgery and often requires a critical healthcare cost. Although the surgical technique has changed in a modern way, the treatment outcome is still influenced by patient age, localization of the bone defect, associated comorbidities, the surgeon approach, and systemic disorders. Three-dimensional magnesium-based scaffolds are considered an important step because they can have precise bone defect geometry, high porosity grade, anatomical pore shape, and mechanical properties close to the human bone. In addition, magnesium has been proven in in vitro and in vivo studies to influence bone regeneration and new blood vessel formation positively. In this review paper, we describe the magnesium alloy's effect on bone regenerative processes, starting with a short description of magnesium's role in the bone healing process, host immune response modulation, and finishing with the primary biological mechanism of magnesium ions in angiogenesis and osteogenesis by presenting a detailed analysis based on a literature review. A strategy that must be followed when a patient-adapted scaffold dedicated to bone tissue engineering is proposed and the main fabrication technologies are combined, in some cases with artificial intelligence for Mg alloy scaffolds, are presented with examples. We emphasized the microstructure, mechanical properties, corrosion behavior, and biocompatibility of each study and made a basis for the researchers who want to start to apply the regenerative potential of magnesium-based scaffolds in clinical practice. Challenges, future directions, and special potential clinical applications such as osteosarcoma and persistent infection treatment are present at the end of our review paper.

Survival of Patient-Specific Unicondylar Knee Replacement

Unicompartmental knee arthroplasty (UKA) in isolated medial or lateral osteoarthritis leads to good clinical results. However, revision rates are higher in comparison to total knee arthroplasty (TKA). One reason is suboptimal fitting of conventional off-the-shelf prostheses, and major overhang of the tibial component over the bone has been reported in up to 20% of cases. In this retrospective study, a total of 537 patient-specific UKAs (507 medial prostheses and 30 lateral prostheses) that had been implanted in 3 centers over a period of 10 years were analyzed for survival, with a minimal follow-up of 1 year (range 12 to 129 months). Furthermore, fitting of the UKAs was analyzed on postoperative X-rays, and tibial overhang was quantified. A total of 512 prostheses were available for follow-up (95.3%). Overall survival rate (medial and lateral) of the prostheses after 5 years was 96%. The 30 lateral UKAs showed a survival rate of 100% at 5 years. The tibial overhang of the prosthesis was smaller than 1 mm in 99% of cases. In comparison to the reported results in the literature, our data suggest that the patient-specific implant design used in this study is associated with an excellent midterm survival rate, particularly in the lateral knee compartment, and confirms excellent fitting.

The Role of Stability and Alignment in Improving Patient Outcomes After Total Knee Arthroplasty

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Total knee arthroplasty (TKA) is an effective treatment option for many patients, but a small group of patients are dissatisfied following TKA.

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Alignment, in combination with balance, stability, and knee kinematics, is an important modifiable surgical factor that can affect patient outcomes.

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Driven by the subset of dissatisfied patients after TKA, new techniques have evolved in the search for a more anatomic reconstruction of individual knee morphology and a more accurate approximation of the individual lower-extremity alignment.

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There is a need to optimize 3 aspects of TKA to improve patient outcomes-mechanical tooling processes, implants that resurface the epiphysis, and techniques that respect the variable anatomy of patients.