Abstract
The major causes of revision total knee are associated with some degree of bone loss. The missing bone must be accounted for to insure success of the revision procedure, to achieve flexion extension balance, restore the joint line to within a centimeter of its previous level, and to assure a proper sizing especially the anteroposterior diameter of the femoral component. In recent years, clinical practice has evolved over time with a general move away from a structural graft with an increase in utilisation of metal augments. Alternatives include cement with or without screw fixation, rarely, with the most common option being the use of metal wedges. With the recent availability of highly porous augments, the role of metal augmentation has increased. Bone graft is now predominantly used in particulate form for contained defects with more limited use of structural graft. The role of the allograft-prosthetic composite has become more limited. For the elderly with osteopenia and massive bone loss, complete metal substitution with an oncology prosthesis has become more common.
The degree of bone loss is a major determinant of the management strategy. For contained defects less than 5 mm, cement alone, with or without screw supplementation, may be adequate. For greater than 5 mm, morselised graft is frequently used. For uncontained defects of up to 15 mm or more, metal augmentation is the first choice. Bone graft techniques can be utilised in this setting, however, these are more time consuming and technically demanding with little demonstrated advantage. For larger, uncontained defects, newer generation highly porous augments and step wedges are useful. Large contained defects can be dealt with utilising impaction grafting, similar to the hip impaction grafting technique. Massive distal defects are expeditiously managed with oncology defects in the case of periprosthetic fracture and/or massive osteolysis particularly when combined with osteopenia in an elderly, low demand patient. Surgeons must be familiar with an array of techniques in order to effectively deal with the wide spectrum of bone defects encountered during revision total knee arthroplasty.
