Women are more prone to hip implant failure than men, say researchers who recently conducted a study.
Total hip replacement, also known as total hip arthroplasty (THA), is more common in women than men. Based on a study conducted by Maria C.S. Inacio, M.S., of the Southern California Permanente Medical Group, San Diego and her colleagues, women are at a higher risk of having a hip implant failure than men.
According to the researcher, sex-specific risk factors and outcomes need to be studied more carefully in THA because of anatomical differences between men and women.
The study looked into details of 35,140 THAs with three years of median follow-up. Out of these 57.5 percent of the patients were women and the average age of the patients was almost 66 years. The patients were enrolled in a total joint replacement registry from April 2001 through December 2010.
"In our analyses of a large THA cohort, including a diverse sample within 46 hospitals, we found that at the median follow-up of 3.0 years women have a higher risk of all-cause (HR [hazard ratio], 1.29) and aseptic (HR, 1.32) revision but not septic revision (HR, 1.17)," the authors said.
Study findings published online by JAMA Internal Medicine, a JAMA Network publication stated:
"A higher proportion of women received 28-mm femoral heads (28.2 percent vs. 13.1 percent) and had metal on highly cross-linked polyethylene-bearing surfaces (60.6 percent vs. 53.7 percent) than men. Men had a higher proportion of 36-mm or larger heads (55.4 percent vs. 32.8 percent) and metal on metal-bearing surfaces (19.4 percent vs. 9.6 percent)," At five-year follow-up, implant survival was 97.4 percent. Device survival for men (97.7 percent) vs. woman (97.1 percent) was significantly different. After adjustments, the hazard ratios for women were 1.29 for all-cause revision, 1.32 for aseptic revision and 1.17 for septic revision, according to the study results."
