Complications of Total Hip Arthroplasty: Standardized List, Definitions, and Stratification Developed by The Hip Society

Abstract

Background Reporting of complications after total hip arthroplasty (THA) is not standardized, and it is done inconsistently across various studies on the topic. Advantages of standardizing complications include improved patient safety and outcomes and better reporting in comparative studies. Questions/purposes The purpose of this project was to develop a standardized list of complications and adverse events associated with THA, develop standardized definitions for each complication, and stratify the complications.

Recognising and dealing with complications in orthopaedic surgery

“…For instance, recent papers have addressed a defined subset of complications 32 or only complications that resulted in a length of stay of >4 days. 33 Interpreting data: complication rate…”

Can Surgeons Adequately Capture Adverse Events Using the Spinal Adverse Events Severity System (SAVES) and OrthoSAVES?

“…A major contributor to these weaknesses lies in the lack of standardized definitions of adverse events [22,34], with variations of the same adverse events identified across studies [4,5,9,22,34]. In response to this deficiency, standardized definitions of adverse events have been proposed [16,17], with the Clavien-Dindo classification being commonly used and reported [7,10].…”

Complications of anaesthesia

“…We do not pretend to have answers to these questions, but they are very typical of the sort of issues that require resolution when complications are used as outcome measures in research. Not surprisingly there are multiple examples of contemporary initiatives to establish definitions of complications a priori before embarking on large studies [23,24].…”