Incidence of Symptomatic COVID-19 in Unvaccinated Patients Within One Month After Elective Total Joint Arthroplasty: A Multicenter Study

Abstract

Background The safety of continuing Total Joint Arthroplasty (TJA), as an elective procedure, during the pandemic is controversial. The present study aimed to investigate the incidence of symptomatic COVID-19 and its related risk factors in unvaccinated patients after TJA within one month post-discharge in two large cities of our country. Methods The present prospective study included all the patients admitted to three hospitals, located in two high-populated cities of our country from April 1st, 2020, to April 1st, 2021, for elective TJA. Urgent TJA (traumatic fractures) were excluded. The primary outcome was symptomatic COVID-19 within one-month after discharge that was diagnosed using the SARS-CoV-2 RT-PCR test. Afterward, the incidence of the COVID-19 in the study population was compared with the general population to estimate the safety of elective TJA during the pandemic. Results From the 1007 patients undergoing TJA, 755 patients met the inclusion criteria. None of the patients was vaccinated against COVID-19. Among them, 18 patients (2.4%) developed symptomatic COVID-19 within one-month after discharge. In the same time interval, the incidence of COVID-19 was 2.2% in the general population of these two cities, which was similar to the incidence reported in the study population. Of the patients who were positive for COVID-19, four patients were hospitalized, and 3 of them were ICU-admitted; however, no mortality was reported. Conclusion The TJA will be a safe elective procedure for the patients during the pandemic if the preventive protocols are followed strictly.

Scientometric Analysis of the Top 50 Most-Cited Joint Arthroplasty Papers: Traditional vs Altmetric Measures

“…Studies on knee arthroplasty were more frequent [ 22 ], followed by hip and knee [ 17 ] and hip arthroplasty [ 12 ]. The Journal of Arthroplasty contributed the greatest number of papers [ 16 ], followed by the Journal of Bone and Joint Surgery [ 6 ], Clinical Orthopedics and Related Research [ 5 ], and Bone and Joint Journal [ 5 ].…”

“…Joint arthroplasty is one of the most common elective surgical procedures globally, and the volume of primary and revision total joint arthroplasty (TJA) has skyrocketed in recent decades. It is important to know the implications of the rapid increase of joint arthroplasty volume for current research in this area [ [6] , [7] , [8] ]. The joint arthroplasty literature is an ever-expanding field with a considerable number of published studies and active researchers.…”

COVID-19 infection rate after urgent versus elective total hip replacement among unvaccinated individuals: A multicenter prospective cohort amid the COVID-19 pandemic

“…We previously reported the incidence of symptomatic COVID-19 in unvaccinated patients who underwent elective TJA within one month of discharge in our country (April 2020–April 2021) [ 23 ]. COVID-19 occurred in 2.4% of patients within one month of TJA discharge, similar to the 1.8% infection rate among elective and urgent THA patients.…”

Minimum infective dose of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 based on the current evidence: A systematic review

“… 1 , 2 COVID-19 started its devastating trajectory into a global pandemic in Wuhan, China. 3 – 5 COVID-19 spread rapidly around the world. Globally, as of 28 March 2022, more than 480 million confirmed cases and 6.1 million deaths due to COVID-19 were reported to the WHO.…”