When you hear industry-wide claims of success rates between 95%-98%, please understand that these are objective findings. Off-the-shelf knee replacements do very well when studied objectively. Many knees on the market today can accurately claim great longevity, range of motion, and stability. But when subjective findings are taken into account what you see is that patient-satisfaction drops to approximately 80%. Those that fall into the 80% of patients that are very happy would do the surgery all over again if they could go back in time. But what about the 1 out of 5 patients who feel very differently? The recipients of the off-the-shelf knee’s who fall into this dissatisfaction rate of 20% will state that their knee does not feel natural after receiving surgery. They may be pain-free, and their x-rays look fantastic, but they are not happy. These patients want more than just pain relief; they want to return to their activities of daily living as it was before receiving their total knee reconstruction. Unlike previous generations, baby boomers expect more from their knee replacements.
Recent improvements in off-the-shelf knee replacements have included computer navigation, more sizes, positioning tools and robotics. All this technology has not shown an improvement in anonymous patient-satisfaction surveys.
Activities such as going up and down stairs and climbing hills, sitting down and standing up can be bothersome. This is the result of compromises that must be made with any off-the-shelf knee replacement. Many healthcare providers believe that since the x-rays look good, then it must be the patient being unreasonable. This leads us to another common topic that is frequently spoken about at the various orthopedic conferences, and that is about how orthopedic surgeons must set realistic expectations to patients undergoing knee reconstruction to improve patient satisfaction. Conformis believes there is a better way and that is through eliminating many of the intra-operative compromises that must be made with traditional knee replacements. Conformis designs a customized knee implant that recreates the natural shape and articulating geometry of the patient’s knee.
Stay tuned for more information on the results of studies that show subjective and objective improvements when the patients receive a customized, individually made knee replacement by Conformis.