WEDNESDAY, Aug. 1 (HealthDay News) -- Joint arthroplasties are rarely performed in patients older than 100, but such patients should not be denied joint replacement due to short-term life expectancy issues, finds a new report in the August issue of Arthritis Care & Research.
Eswar Krishnan, M.D., M.P.H., of the University of Pittsburgh, and colleagues analyzed data from a large United States hospital discharge database to compare the rates and short-term outcomes of joint arthroplasty in centenarians to that of their younger, nonagenarian counterparts.
Overall, there were 679 hip replacement surgeries and 7 knee arthroplasties performed among the centenarians in the new study. By contrast, there were 33,975 hip arthroplasties and 2,065 knee replacement surgeries among the nonaganarian control group. Centenarians who underwent hip arthroplasty were at a greater risk for mortality than their younger counterparts, but this difference was similar to that seen in in-hospital mortality between the two groups.
"This study provides data that suggest arthroplasty need not be denied to centenarians solely on account of age and the concern off high in-hospital mortality risk," the study authors concluded.
Abstract
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