Several radiological methods of measuring anteversion of the acetabular component after total hip arthroplasty (THA) have been described. These are limited by low reproducibility, are less accurate than CT 3D reconstruction, and are cumbersome to use. These methods also partly rely on the identification of obscured radiological borders of the component. We propose two novel methods, the Area and Orthogonal methods, which have been designed to maximize use of readily identifiable points while maintaining the same trigonometric principles. A retrospective study of plain radiographs was conducted on 160 hips of 141 patients who had undergone primary THA. We compared the reliability and accuracy of the Area and Orthogonal methods with two of the current leading methods: those of Widmer and Lewinnek, respectively.Aims
Patients and Methods
A pelvic discontinuity occurs when the superior
and inferior parts of the hemi-pelvis are no longer connected, which
is difficult to manage when associated with a failed total hip replacement.
Chronic pelvic discontinuity is found in 0.9% to 2.1% of hip revision
cases with risk factors including severe pelvic bone loss, female
gender, prior pelvic radiation and rheumatoid arthritis. Common
treatment options include: pelvic plating with allograft, cage reconstruction,
custom triflange implants, and porous tantalum implants with modular augments.
The optimal technique is dependent upon the degree of the discontinuity,
the amount of available bone stock and the likelihood of achieving
stable healing between the two segments. A method of treating pelvic
discontinuity using porous tantalum components with a distraction
technique that achieves both initial stability and subsequent long-term
biological fixation is described. Cite this article:
