A new study says that one in seven patients who have hip or knee replacement surgery are readmitted to the hospital within a year.
Most of these hospitalizations are due to complications from the surgery, including infections or an ill-fitting new joint. About 1 per cent of patients, many of them having had hip replacements, have their procedures entirely re-done.
The study, released Wednesday by the Canadian Institute for Health Information (CIHI), looked at more than 51,000 first-time hip or knee replacement operations that took place outside of Quebec in 2005-2006.
Of the patients who were re-admitted to the hospital in the year following their operation, 18 per cent had an infection, loosening or dislocation of the new joint. More men than women contracted infections, and it was more common for patients with diabetes to have infections than non-diabetic patients.
"While joint replacement surgery can certainly improve the quality of a patient's life, it is not always without complications," Tracy Johnson, a project consultant at the CIHI, said in a written statement. "Investigating the reasons for these extra hospitalizations can offer opportunities to improve quality, reduce costs and improve both hospital and surgeon availability for other patients who need care."
Patients who had complications spent 44,000 more days in the hospital when compared to the year before their surgery. The extra cost of these hospital stays added up to about $45 million.
In 2004, joint replacement surgery was included with cancer, heart surgery, sight restoration and diagnostic imaging on the priority list for reducing patient wait times. In the first fiscal year following this decree, hip and knee replacements grew by 17 per cent.
Hip and knee replacement operations increased 100 per cent over the ten-year period leading up to 2005-2006. Including initial procedures and those that had to be re-done, more than 68,000 hip and knee replacements were done in Canada in 2005-2006.
While 63 per cent of patients having these operations were 65 years of age or over, the rate of these procedures increased dramatically among other age groups.
"Right now, the average age in Canada for a joint replacement is somewhere around late sixties, early seventies. But with this big spike of young people, what you'll see is that you're going to have a bunch of people who'll have joint replacements from age 45 on," said Halifax Infirmary Dr. Michael Dunbar.
Knee replacements for both men and women aged 45 to 54 tripled over the ten years leading up to the study. Hip replacements grew by 68 per cent for men in this demographic and 52 per cent for women.
In the 55 to 64 age bracket, the most notable increase was for women undergoing knee replacements. There was a 229 per cent increase in these surgeries between 1995-1996 and 2005-2006.
