Prophylaxis and treatment for infection following total knee replacement

Sheng HE; Yirong ZENG

ABSTRACT

BACKGROUND: It is difficult to revise replacement due to infection-induced osteodeficiency, osteoporosis, soft tissue lost orcicatrization.OBJECTIVE: To establish the standardized clinical prevention and treatment methods by summarizing the new progress to prevent, diagnosis of the infection, and its effective treatment, as well as rehabilitation evaluation after total Knee replacement. METHODS: A computer-based online search of CNKI and PUBMED database between January 1990 and December 2010 was performed to search related articles with the key words of total knee arthroplasty, infection. A total of 2 346 articles were retrieved. Moreover, related works were manually searched. Totally, 30 articles were included.RESULTS AND CONCLUSION: It is better to prevent infection rather than treatment after total knee replacement. Currently, there is lack of a clear diagnosis standard on the infection. In treatment aspect, debridement, revision surgery, and choosing effective antibiotics can effectively control the infection. Meantime, new methods are expected to improve the success rate of infection after total knee replacement. Exercise is a continuation of rehabilitation therapy and an important step in treatment. Therefore, on the basis of total knee replacement, it is important to establish the early prevention of postoperative infection, early diagnosis, effective treatment and rehabilitation evaluation system, in order to minimize the incidence of infection and treat infections timely and effectively.