Abstract
Introduction
Recent studies have indicated that healthy and willing patients above 80 years have similar outcomes as younger patients following arthroplasty. We wished to investigate the outcomes in a cohort of patients above 80 years who underwent medial unicompartment knee replacement (UKA).
Material/methods
46 patients (51 knees) with UKA aged 80 or more formed the study group. For comparison rest of the UKA patients in the database were divided into groups according to their age. Patients were reviewed and KSS, complication rates and patient satisfaction information was collected. Revision for any cause was considered an endpoint. Significance was set at < 0.05.
Results
The mean age was 82.86 years in the study group. The mean KSS (objective) of the study group improved significantly (p=0.00) from 32.55 to 85.21 at one year follow-up. This was maintained at three years (85.00) and five years (84.23). 93% patients in the study group reported that they were satisfied with the surgery at one year; 97% at three years and 100% at five years. The overall complication rate in the study group was highest (21.6%) in comparison with the other groups which had rates of 18.2%, 17.1% and 19.4% in the age groups less than 60, 60 to 69 and 70 to 79 respectively. However, no significant difference of implant survival was found amongst all age groups (p=0.08).
Conclusions
This study concludes that patients aged 80 or more should be considered for Oxford UKA if they fulfil the described suitability criteria as the results and outcomes are predictable.
