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Mayo Clinic study finds total hip replacement among older patients provides better quality of lifeJohn
Murphy
EurekAlert,
March 14, 2003
Mayo Clinic
researchers discuss their results in the March issue of Mayo Clinic
Proceedings. The results provide important information as baby boomers
age, increasing the number of people who will require total hip
replacement in their 90s. Other patients who are 90 and older will require
a second total hip replacement. "Primary-care
physicians and surgeons should be aware that both primary and revision
total hip replacement can be done safely and effectively in patients 90
years old and older and can result in years of pain relief and functional
improvement," said Mark Pagnano, M.D., Mayo Clinic orthopedic surgeon
and an author of the study. "In our study, the typical patient lived
for more than five years after hip replacement and had substantial relief
of pain and improvement of function during that period." Researchers
reviewed the medical records of 65 patients, 90 years and older, who had
total hip replacement surgery -- both primary or a revision of a previous
surgery -- from 1970 to 1997. Dr. Pagnano
notes that there were medical and surgical complications but that they
seldom compromised the outcome of the operation. He says that patients in
this age category often have medical conditions, such as hypertension,
anemia or a history of cardiac disease, which make the surgery more
challenging. With that in mind, he says it's important for patients to be
monitored closely for medical complications in the early postoperative
period. Authors of the
study along with Dr. Pagnano included Lori McLamb and Robert Trousdale,
M.D., Mayo Clinic Department of Orthopedic Surgery. In an
editorial in the same issue of Mayo Clinic Proceedings, James O'Brien,
M.D., of the Department of Family and Community Medicine at the University
of Louisville Health Sciences Center, writes that the study "provides
a glimpse into the future and highlights the challenge that physicians,
orthopedists in particular, are likely to confront." Dr. O'Brien
notes that the most rapidly growing segment of the United States'
population is the group 85 years and older. "But
perhaps even more dramatic is the increase in centenarians (those age 100
and older) with a predicted doubling each decade in the future," Dr.
O'Brien said. "Thus, treatment of this age group will become much
more commonplace." Dr. O'Brien
said the most important findings of the study are related to reduction of
pain, restoration of function and patient satisfaction -- all valued
outcomes in the care of older patients. ### Mayo Clinic
Proceedings is a peer-reviewed and indexed general internal medicine
journal, published for more than 75 years by Mayo Foundation, with a
circulation of 130,000 nationally and internationally. Copyright
© 2002 Global Action on Aging
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