Abstract
The goal of this study was to validate accuracy and reproducibility of a new 2D/3D reconstruction-based program called “HipRecon” for determining cup orientation after THA. “HipRecon” uses a statistical shape model based 2D/3D deformable registration technique that can reconstruct a patient-specific 3D model from a single standard AP pelvic X-ray radiograph. Required inputs include a digital radiograph, the pixel size, and the film-to-source distance. No specific calibration of the X-ray, or a CAD (computer-assisted design) model of the implant, or a CT-scan of the patient is required. Cup orientation is then calculated with respect to the anterior pelvic plane that is derived from the reconstructed 3D-model.
The validation study was conducted on datasets of 29 patients (31 hips). Among them, there were 15 males and 14 females. Each dataset has one post-operative X-ray radiograph and one post-operative CT-scan. The post-operative CT scan for each patient was used to establish the ground truth for the cup orientation. Radiographs with deep centering (7 radiographs), or of pelvises with fractures (2 radiographs), or with both (1 radiograph), or of non-hemispherely shaped cup (1 radiograph) were assessed separately from the radiographs without above mentioned phenomena (18 radiographs) to estimate a potential influence on the 2D/3D reconstruction accuracy. To make the description easier, we denote those radiographs with above mentioned phenomena as non-normal cases and those without as normal cases. The cup anteversions and inclinations that were calculated by “HipRecon” were compared to the associated ground truth. To validate the reproducibility and the reliability, one observer conducted twice measurements for each dataset using “HipRecon”.
The mean accuracy for the normal cases was 0.4° ± 1.8° (−2.6° to 3.3°) for inclination and 0.6° ± 1.5° (−2.0° to 3.9°) for anteversion, and the mean accuracy for the non-normal cases was 2.3° ± 2.4° (−2.1° to 6.3°) for inclination and 0.1° ± 2.8° (−4.6° to 5.1°) for anteversion. Comparing the measurement from the normal radiographs to those from the non-normal radiographs using the Mann-Whitney U-test, we found a significant difference in measuring cup inclination (p = 0.01) but not in measuring cup anteversion (p = 0.3). Bland-Altman analysis of those measurements from the normal cases indicated that no systematical error was detected for “HipRecon,” as the mean of the measurement pairs were spread evenly and randomly for both inclination and anteversion. “HipRecon” showed a very good reproducibility for both parameters with an intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC) for inclination of 0.98 (95% Confidence Limits (CL): 0.96–0.99) and for anteversion of 0.96 (95% CL: 0.91–0.98).
Accurate assessment of the acetabular cup orientation is important for evaluation of outcome after THA, but the inability to measure acetabular cup orientation accurately limits one's ability to determine optimal cup orientations, to assess new treatment methods of improving acetabular cup orientation in surgery, and to correlate the acetabular cup orientation to osteolysis, wear, and instability. In this study, we showed that “HipRecon” was an accurate, consistent, and reproducible technique to measure cup orientation from post-operative X-ray radiographs. Furthermore, our experimental results indicated that the best results were achieved with the radiographs of non-fractured pelvises that included the anterior superior iliac spines and the cranial part of the non-fractured pelvis. Thus, it is recommended that these landmarks should be included in the radiograph whenever the 2D/3D reconstruction-based method will be used
