Does the body mass index influence the long-term survival of unicompartmental knee prostheses? A retrospective multi-centre study.

Purpose: The effect of being obese on the long-term survival of total joint arthroplasty is persistently discussed. Considering only studies with large cohort of patients and meta-analysis, a high body mass index has been correlated with a higher incidence of complication but not univocally with a lower survival rate. In this study, we analyzed, retrospectively, the data of patients that received unicompartmental knee prostheses in order to examine if obesity has an effect on clinical outcomes.

Methods: A retrospective multi-centre study was carried out on 4964 unicompartmental knee replacements between July 2000 and December 2016, the patients involved were 3976, with 988 bilateral cases. The patients were categorized into three groups: non-obese with a body mass index (BMI) < 30 kg/m, obese with BMI ranged between 30 and 39 kg/m, and morbidly obese (BMI ≥ 40 kg/m). The outcome was measured using the Cox proportional hazards model with end point UKA revision for any reasons. Results were stratified for sex, age, weight, and bi-laterality.

Results: The morbidly obese group was significantly younger and required a significantly longer operating time. No statistical significant differences were observed considering the BMI groups in terms of type of insert, type of tibial component, prosthetic condyle, and prosthesis fixation (p > 0.05; chi-square test).

Conclusions: Obese and morbidly obese patients have as much to gain from total knee replacement as non-obese patients.