title: Function and quality of life following medial unicompartmental knee arthroplasty in patients 60 years of age or younger.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  UKA is an appropriate bone-sparing solution for focal advanced knee osteoarthritis in young patients. As the expectations of patients younger than 60 years of age are different from those in an older population, we aimed to evaluate quality of life and the quality of sports activity after UKA in this population.
  
  
  METHODS
  Sixty-five UKAs in 62 patients younger than 60 (mean age: 54.7 years; mean BMI: 28 kg/m(2)) performed between 1989 and 2006 were included. At last follow-up (minimum 2 years), before the objective evaluation, patients were asked to fill in a KOOS questionnaire and a specific sports questionnaire including the UCLA score and questions from the Mohtadi score.
  
  
  RESULTS
  With a mean follow-up of 11.2±5 years (range, 2-19 years), the KOOS score was higher than 75 points in 90% of the patients for the quality-of-life categories but also for the score's four other categories: 83.4% of the patients had resumed their sports activities and the mean UCLA score was 6.8 (range, 4-9); 90% of the patients reported no or slight limitation during sports activities. The function KSS improved from 52±4 to 95±3 points postoperatively and the Knee KSS from 50±4 to 94±4 points. With three patients undergoing revision for an isolated insert exchange, one for septic loosening and three for osteoarthritis in the external compartment, the 12-year Kaplan-Meier survivorship was 94%.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  These results confirmed that UKA can provide good patient-rated outcomes, which is very important in this demanding population. As for TKA, wear remains a problem in this active population.
  
  
  METHODS
  Therapeutic study, level IV.
authors.affiliation: Department of Orthopaedic Surgery, Sainte-Marguerite Hospital, boulevard de Sainte-Marguerite, 13009 Marseille, France.
authors.forename: E
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Felts
authors.forename: S
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Parratte
authors.forename: V
authors.initials: V
authors.lastname: Pauly
authors.forename: J-M
authors.initials: JM
authors.lastname: Aubaniac
authors.forename: J-N
authors.initials: JN
authors.lastname: Argenson
mesh_terms: D000203:Activities of Daily Living / Q000145:classification / Q000523:psychology; D000328:Adult; D019645:Arthroplasty, Replacement, Knee / Q000523:psychology*; D005260:Female; D005500:Follow-Up Studies; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D020370:Osteoarthritis, Knee / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging / Q000601:surgery*; D010147:Pain Measurement; D017060:Patient Satisfaction; D011183:Postoperative Complications / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging / Q000209:etiology* / Q000523:psychology*; D011474:Prosthesis Design; D011788:Quality of Life / Q000523:psychology*; D011859:Radiography; D012189:Retrospective Studies; D013177:Sports / Q000523:psychology; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires