Abstract
Introduction:
Recently, patient expectations regarding the outcomes of total knee arthroplasty (TKA) have increase due to advances in knee implant design, surgical techniques, and procedure safety. However, outcomes do not always meet preoperative expectations. The purpose of this study is to investigate what Korean patients expect from their TKA and relationship between Pre-TKA expectation and demographic factors.
Methods:
We performed a prospective study of 228 patients undergoing primary TKA from April 2013 to May 2013. The number of men and women were 211 (92.5%) and 17 (7.5%) respectively, and mean age was 70.9. We used 19-item clinical knee assessment questionnaire including “crossed leg” item for unique sedentary culture in eastern countries. Each item was evaluated on a Likert scale from 0 to 4 (0: not relevant, 1: relevant, 2: little important, 3: somewhat important, 4: very important). We also used another questionnaire regarding to patient's demographics. Score of all expectation was calculated by sum of all item score.
Results:
The five most expectations among 19 items before TKA were 1) Improvement in walking, 2) Reduction in pain, 3) Improvement in climbing upstairs and downstairs, 4) Improvement in changing position, 5) improvement in daily activity (average score: 3.98 ± 0.22, 3.96 ± 0.25, 3.95 ± 0.28, 3.94 ± 0.25 and 3.92 ± 0.34 respectively). Crossed leg was ranked 7th. In univariate logistic regression test, no demographic factors (age, BMI, sex, use of the bed, urban dwelling, cohabitation, degree of daily exercise, income, degree of education, presence of spouse, religion, employed or not) statistically influenced on these five items. But in minor expectation items, some association was noted with demographic factors. Low income influenced on expectation of public transportation use (p = 0.001) and job activity (p = 0.023). Young age and absence of spouse influenced on expectation of leisure activity (p = 0.004 and 0.022). Large amount of exercise influenced on expectation of sexual activity after TKA (p = 0.00001). In score of all expectation, more expectation on TKA was reported in young age (p = 0.002), male sex (p = 0.015), urban dwelling (p = 0.037) and large amount of exercise (p = 0.002).
Discussion and conclusion:
Most of patients wanted pain relief and improvement of walking and exercise activity regardless of demographic factors. But in minor expectation items, some association was noted with demographic factors. Young age, male, urban dweller and patients with more exercise demanded more expectation on TKA. We need more study evaluating whether this expectation is same after one or more years of TKA.
