Promoting cemented fixation of the femoral stem in elderly female hip arthroplasty patients and elderly hip fracture patients: a retrospective cohort study from the Norwegian Arthroplasty Register and the Norwegian Hip Fracture Register.

BACKGROUND AND PURPOSE: Uncemented stems increase the risk of revision in elderly patients. In 2018, we initiated a national quality improvement project aiming to increase the proportion of cemented stems in elderly female total hip arthroplasty (THA) and hip fracture hemiarthroplasty (HA) patients. We aimed to evaluate the association of this project on the frequency of cemented stems and the risk of secondary procedures in the targeted population.

METHODS: 10,815 THAs in female patients ≥ 75 years in the Norwegian Arthroplasty Register and 19,017 HAs in hip fracture patients ≥ 70 years in the Norwegian Hip Fracture Register performed in 2015-2017 and 2019-2021 at all Norwegian hospitals were included in this retrospective cohort study. The quality improvement project was implemented at 19 hospitals (8,443 patients). 1-year revision risk (THAs) and reoperation risk (HAs) were calculated for uncemented and cemented stems by Kaplan-Meier and Cox adjusted hazard rate ratios (aHRRs) with all-cause revision/reoperation as main endpoint.

RESULTS: The use of cemented stem fixation in the targeted population increased from 26% to 80% for THAs and from 27% to 91% for HAs. For THAs, the 1-year revision rate decreased from 3.7% in 2015-2017 to 2.1% in 2019-2021 (aHRR 0.7, 95% confidence interval [CI] 0.5-0.9) at the intervention hospitals. For HAs, the reoperation rate decreased from 5.9% in 2015-2017 to 3.3% in 2019-2021 (aHRR 0.6, CI 0.4-0.8) at the intervention hospitals.

CONCLUSION: The quality improvement project resulted in a significant increase in the proportion of cemented stems and reduced risk of secondary procedures for both THAs and HAs.