Patient Education: MIS Joint Replacement

Minimally Invasive Surgery

You don’t have to live with severe joint pain and the limitations it puts on your activities. If you haven’t experienced adequate relief with medication and other conservative treatments, MIS joint replacement may provide the pain relief you long for and enable you to return to your favorite activities.

Over the past 25 years, minimally invasive surgery has revolutionized many fields of medicine. Its key characteristic is that it uses specialized techniques and instrumentation that enable the physician to perform major surgery without a large incision. In this respect, MIS knee and hip joint replacement is indeed “minimally invasive”, requiring only a small incision and causing minimal trauma to the soft-tissues. Minimally invasive surgical techniques may offer benefits including: less pain, less recovery time, and less scarring.

Revolutionary Ceramic Hip Replacement

The Trident® Ceramic Acetabular System is an artificial hip replacement device that features a new, state-of-the-art ceramic-on-ceramic bearing couple. The artificial hip replacement device consists of four basic components: an alumina ceramic insert (socket liner), an alumina ceramic femoral head (ball), a metal acetabular shell (socket), and a metal femoral stem (hip stem).

The hip stem is inserted into the top of the thighbone. The ball fits onto the top of the hip stem. The socket liner and mating socket are fixed to the hip joint. The ball and socket articulate together.

Less Wear Than Metal and Plastic

The Trident® implant has bearing surfaces (the ball and socket) made of alumina ceramic. Laboratory testing of alumina ceramic has shown it to have less wear than the metal and plastic materials that are currently used in total hip surgery. Alumina ceramic is extremely hard – in fact, its hardness is second only to diamond – and provides excellent lubrication between the ball and socket. Because of its material characteristics, alumina ceramic-on-ceramic demonstrates significantly lower wear versus conventional metal-on-plastic components in laboratory testing. Therefore, it is anticipated that these improved wear characteristics will extend the life of the implants. The patented design of the Trident® Ceramic insert makes it the strongest ceramic insert available on the market today. Dr. Rieber will discuss the exact type of prosthesis and surgical procedure with you.

Computer-Assisted Total Knee Replacement

Total knee replacement (TKR) has been performed in the U.S. for nearly 40 years. Now there may be a significant advancement using new advanced surgical computer technology to make a good procedure even better.

TKR has proved to be an extremely successful way to treat patients suffering from severe knee pain. TKR restores function and returns patients to normal activity. The knee navigation system builds on this success by allowing surgeons to make intra-operative adjustments to within a fraction of a degree and thereby, ensuring the greatest possible precision and best fit for the prosthesis. These advances can result in shorter hospitalizations, fewer complications and improved stability and longevity of the prosthesis.

TKR is usually reserved for patients with severe arthritic conditions. Most patients are over 50 years, but the operation is being performed in younger patients thanks to new technology like the navigated total knee system.