Arizona Tops in Joint Replacements

It may be the “retiree-syndrome, ” the result of all the snow-birds moving to Arizona to escape the cold winters in their home states, that has the number of knee replacements performed in that desert state increasing by 154% over the past decade. Hip replacements in Arizona have gone up 92% in the same time period, a sum that is more than the national numbers. 

Sonja Haller wrote on July 22 for the Tucson Citizen that in 2010, surgeons performed 25, 000 knee and hip replacements. A primary reason for the surgeries, Haller writes, is obesity and its association with osteoarthritis. A secondary reason, she noted, is the Boomer mind-set that insists on living an active physical lifestyle without limitations.

Surgeons perform more than 1, 170, 000 joint replacements (720, 000 of them knees) every year in the United States. Studies by the Journal of Bone and Joint Surgery expect the combined first-time replacements to surge to 3.4 million by 2030. About 10% of implants will fail, according to estimates by the American Academy of Orthopaedic Surgeons, and thus will require a second procedure.

Many of the revision surgeries are being performed on patients who had their initial implants while still in their 40s—despite many doctors’ advice that they wait until they are in their 60s because no artificial joint lasts forever. Haller quotes Christopher Beauchamp, M.D., who specializes in hip replacements at the Mayo Clinic. He reminds his patients that, “We don’t have the capability of replacing our normal anatomy. You have to think of (implants) as car tires. They have a certain amount of mileage on them. How you drive them determines how long they will last.” Boomers take note.