Implant survival outcomes after total ankle replacement (a systematic literature review)

Aim of the study: to conduct a systematic review of the literature on the evaluation of implant survival outcomes after total ankle arthroplasty, the number of revision surgeries.

Materials and methods. The search for scientific articles was conducted by two independent researchers in the Elibrary, Pubmed, Research Gate, and Google Academy databases in two languages: Russian and English. The search depth was 5 years. A total of 247 publications were analyzed, including: Pubmed: – 52; Research Gate – 100; Google Academy – 66, Elibrary – 29. After the final selection, 6 scientific papers were included in the study, of which 2 were national registries, 3 were retrospective and 1 was a prospective cohort study.

Results. The average survival rate of ankle endoprostheses in the early postoperative period (1–2 years) is close to 100%, in the medium term (5-7 years) the implant survival rate is at the level of 90%, the 10-year survival rate of endoprostheses has values from 77% to 87.5%. The average value of the revision surgery rate over 19 years is 12.9%.

Conclusion. The service life of ankle joint endoprostheses is close to 100% during the first 2 years. However, in the long term, the implant survival rate is in the range of 77%-87.5%. The reasons leading to the need for revision interventions have not been fully studied. According to the authors, unresolved axial deformations during ankle joint endoprosthetics directly affect the survival of the implants. Of course, additional research is needed to understand this issue in more detail.

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