Increased long-term failure risk associated with excessively thin cement mantle in cemented hip arthroplasty: a comparative in vitro study.

Background: There is no consensus on possible detrimental effects of reduced thickness of the cement mantle surrounding hip stems. This work originated from the suspect that a successful design would yield inferior survival when implanted with a lower cement thickness. The scope was to assess with a reproducible in vitro experiment if a thinner cement mantle could cause a reduction of the long-term implant fatigue resistance.