The early results of gender-specific total knee arthroplasty in Thai patients

We prospectively evaluated a consecutive series of 314 patients (265 females and 49 males) who underwent unilateral TKA and received an average of 2 years of follow-up. In all patients, a standard (STD) or a gender-specific (GS) femoral component was selected based on the presentation of intra-operative medio-lateral overhanging of the femoral cutting guide over the femoral condyle. There were no significant differences in the pre-operative parameters of both groups. At the last follow-up, both STD and GS groups had similarly improved KS clinical scores (92.9 vs. 92.1 points), function scores (89.5 vs. 89.7 points) and ROM (133.5 degrees vs. 134.1 degrees) with no difference in the rate of lateral retinacular release. The overall percentage of the GS component selection was 52.5% (165/314) and was significantly higher in female patients than male patients (60.8% vs. 8.2%, p<0.0001). In addition, selected GS prostheses increased significantly with increasing femoral size (25% for size C, 53% for size D, 86% for size E, and 100% for size F, respectively). There were no complications or early loosening related to the GS prosthesis. The mean post-operative limb alignment was 5.5 degrees of the anatomical valgus with no difference between groups. We concluded that the GS femoral component did not provide better clinical outcomes than the standard femoral component; however, it provided surgical ease to minimize prosthesis overhanging in patients with narrow femoral condyles. (C) 2010 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.