Evaluating 350 hips, researchers from the Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, Missouri, found that 10-year survival was about 94%.
Their work, “Five to Ten-Year Results of the Birmingham Hip Resurfacing Implant in the U.S.: A Single Institution’s Experience,” appears in the November 7, 2018 edition of The Journal of Bone and Joint Surgery.
Robert L. Barrack, M.D., the Charles and Joanne Knight Distinguished Professor in the Department of Orthopaedic Surgery at the Washington University School of Medicine and study co-author told OTW, “The current study documents the mid-term (5-10 year) results in our first 350 hips.”
“The results for the group overall was good with a 10-year survival of about 94%. The results for patients who are now considered good candidates for the BHR (young active males with osteoarthritis), the 10-year survival rate was 98-99%.”
“Even more impressive is the activity level documented for this group of patients. Activity is objectively rated on the 10-point UCLA [University of California Los Angeles] Activity Rating Scale with UCLA 9 and 10 encompassing running and cutting sports. About 60% of the young male cohort were still participating at this high of a sporting level 5-10 years after their BHR.”
“We compared that to a matched cohort of the most active total hip patients who were matched for age, gender, diagnosis, BMI, and pre-op activity level and only about 20% of patients were at the UCLA 9 or 10 level after standard THA.”
History of the Birmingham Hip
According to Dr. Barrack, “Birmingham Hip Resurfacing (BHR) was introduced in its current form in 1997 by Derek McMinn and Ronan Treacy in Birmingham, UK.”
“It was the first metal-metal hip resurfacing approved by the FDA in May of 2006 after more than 50,000 had been performed in over a dozen countries outside the U.S. Part of the appeal of the resurfacing device is that rather than removing the patient’s femoral head and neck and placing a metal stem five or more inches into the femur, the damaged cartilage and a very thin layer over underlying bone is machined away and replaced with a spherical metal surface the same size as the patient’s head.”
“A matching metal spherical component is placed in the pelvis. The result is a hip that is more stable and has a track record of withstanding higher activity levels without deleterious effects.”
“This is a more technically demanding procedure with less margin for error than a standard total hip and some unique potential complications such as reaction to metal debris.”
“In our series, however, we saw very few problems and the few revisions that were required were straight forward with conversion to a standard total hip with results similar to a standard total hip. All of these procedures, however, were performed by high volume experienced hip specialists and the results reported may not be representative of what could be expected in other scenarios.”
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