Are surgeons equally satisfied after total knee arthroplasty?

Introduction. We performed a clinical follow-up study to investigate whether three orthopaedic surgeons were equally satisfied after total knee arthroplasty (TKA). Patients and methods. Thirty-six patients (39 TKAs, mean follow-up 12 months) were reviewed, using the Knee Society Clinical Rating System (KSCRS). For the assessment of satisfaction a visual analogue scale (VAS) was used. Results. We did not find a significant difference in satisfaction between the surgeons. However, there was a significant difference in the knee score and function score of the KSCRS as evaluated by the orthopaedic surgeons (p=0.006 and p=0.04, respectively). The correlation between the knee score and the surgeons' satisfaction was high, which indicates that pain, range of motion and deformity are important success criteria for surgeons. Conclusions. In this study, surgeons scored differently in the KSCRS but were equally satisfied after TKA.