Abstract
Background
The effect of body mass index (BMI) on blood loss in simultaneous bilateral total hip arthroplasty (SBTHA) was still undetermined. The purpose of the study was to evaluate the blood loss, transfusion and incidence of complications in normal, overweight, and obese patients undergoing SBTHA.
Methods
A total of 344 patients following SBTHA were enrolled into this study. The patients were assigned into three groups on the basis of their BMI, including normal (BMI 18.0–24.9 kg/
Results
The PBV and TBL increased significantly along with the elevated BMI (
Conclusion
Obesity could increase perioperative blood loss but not increase transfusion risk in the setting of SBTHA. Conversely, obese and overweight patients maybe have lower transfusion need compared with normal patients because of more blood volume. In addition, obesity did not affect the incidence of complications.
Keywords
Introduction
Total hip arthroplasty (THA) could alleviate pain, correct deformity, and improve function for advanced diseases of hip.1,2 In recent decades, the prevalence of obesity is growing rapidly. 3 Obesity has been a troublesome public health problem, which could substantially increase the risk of diabetes, cardiovascular disease, and hip disease. 4 Some studies have shown that obese patients took higher risk of suffering from hip disease and undergoing THA.5,6
Hip disease often progresses bilaterally, so it is necessary to conduct simultaneous bilateral total hip arthroplasty (SBTHA). 7 Compared with patients in unilateral THA, patients undergoing SBTHA enjoyed lower costs, lower anesthesia episodes and hospitalizations. 8 In addition, recent researches demonstrated that the incidence of complications, the functional and clinical outcomes were comparable between SBTHA and unilateral THA. Therefore, more and more surgeons and patients selected SBTHA as the treatment for bilateral hip diseases.9–11
To our best knowledge, investigations into the relationship between BMI and blood loss, transfusion as well as complications in THA was limited. Frish et al. found that patients with increased BMI had lower rates of blood transfusion and lost smaller percentage of estimated blood volume following primary THA. 12 Another study showed that underweight patients undergoing primary THA had a higher risk for developing postoperative anemia compared with morbidly obese patients. 13 Simultaneous bilateral total hip arthroplasty was always associated with much blood loss, higher transfusions and increased incidence of complications compared with primary unilateral THA.14,15 However, there have been no study to evaluate the effect of BMI on blood loss, transfusion as well as complications following SBTKA. Moreover, our previous study showed that Ⅰ–Ⅱ obesity did not affect blood loss or the incidence of complications after SBTKA, and obese and overweight patients may have lower transfusion needs compared with normal patients because of their greater blood volume . 16
Thus, we performed a multicenter retrospective study to evaluate the blood loss, transfusion risk, and incidence of complications in normal, overweight, and obese patients following SBTKA.
Materials and methods
Study population
This was a retrospective study and the data was from a multicenter database established to evaluate the efficacy and safety of perioperative management following THA and TKA in China. The database included related data from 26 university teaching hospitals, sponsored by the Chinese Health Ministry (201,302,007).11,17 The study was approved by our hospital’s Institutional Review Board (2012-268).
We identified the patients of SBTHA using International Classification of Diseases,Tenth Revision, Clinical Modification (ICD-10-CM) procedure codes from January 2013 to December 2016. SBTHA was defined as procedure performed under a single episode of anesthesia. We excluded the patients with BMI < 18 kg/
Surgery procedure and perioperative management
The surgery was performed by experienced surgeons through the posterolateral approach. All the patients received cementless prosthesis. The drain was used at the end of the operation and removed when the volume of drain was less than 30 mL/h. The physical prophylaxis and chemoprophylaxis was applied to prevent deep venous thrombosis (DVT). Physical prophylaxis included the exercises of ankle pump and knee extension, and the application of intermittent pneumatic compression device early postoperatively. Chemoprophylaxis included the application of low-molecular-weight heparin or rivaroxaban, which was used 6–8 h postoperatively and repeated at 24 h intervals, continuing 14 days at last. Patients began to receive tranexamic acid (20 mg/kg) intravenously 5–10 min before the skin incision, or the combination of intravenous and topical tranexamic acid from January 2014. 19
Transfusions were given when the hemoglobin (Hb) level was < 70 g/L or 70–100 g/L with symptoms of anemia (defined as bad mental status, palpitation or shortness of breath not due to other causes) according to the guidelines by the National Ministry of Health. 20
Outcome measurements
The primary outcomes were total blood loss (TBL), calculated by the Gross and Nadler formula.21,22 TBL = patient’s blood volume (PBV) × (Hctpre-Hctpost)/Hctave (Hctpre = the initial preoperative Hct level, Hctpost = the Hct on the morning of POD3. PBV = k1 × height (m)³ + k2 × weight (kg) + k3 (k1 = 0.3669, k2 = 0.03,219, and k3 = 0.6041 for men; and k1 = 0.3561, k2 = 0.03,308, and k3 = 0.1833 for women, Hctave = the average of the Hctpre and Hctpost). If either reinfusion or allogeneic transfusion was performed, the TBL was equal to the loss calculated from the change in Hct plus the volume transfuse. 23 The secondary outcomes were intraoperative blood loss (IBL), drain volume, the ratio of TBL and patient blood volume (PBV), transfusion volume and rate, maximum Hb and hematocrit (Hct) drop, length of stay (LOS), expenses, and the incidence of complications. IBL was calculated by anesthesiologist and nurse on the basis of our pervious study. 16 The ratio showed the proportion of TBL in the estimated blood volume. The maximum Hb and Hct drop were the minus of preoperative Hb or Hct and the lowest postoperative Hb or Hct during hospitalization.
Statistical analyses
All data were analyzed by using SPSS version 22.0 (SPSS Inc. USA). We compared the continuous variables using one-way analysis of variance, Wilcoxon Mann–Whitney U test or independent t-test. The Pearson chi-square test or Fisher exact test was applied to compare categorical variables. A
Results
Demographics
Baseline characteristics.
BMI: Body mass index = Weight/Height2; DA: Degenerative arthritis, including primary osteoarthritis and secondary osteoarthritis caused by developmental dysplasia of hip (typeⅠandⅡ) and osteonecrosis of the femoral head; IA: Inflammatory arthritis, including ankylosing spondylitis, rheumatoid arthritis and traumatic arthritis; COPD: Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease; Hb: Hemoglobin; Hct: Hematocrit; PBV: patient blood volume; LMWH: low-molecular-weight heparin; TXA, tranexamic acid; ASA: American Society of Anesthesiologists.
*Significant difference.
Blood loss
Comparison of blood loss.
TBL: Total blood loss; IBL: intraoperative blood loss; PBV: patient blood volume; Hb: Hemoglobin; Hct: Hematocrit; LOS: length of stay.
∆Results were presented as Chinese yuan.
*Significant difference.
Complications
LOS and complications.
DVT: deep venous thrombosis; PE: pulmonary embolism.
Discussion
With the increased number of obese patients undergoing THA, the safety and effect for these people has been an essential issue. 6 The majority of studies paid attention to the influence of BMI on pain, function, and complications after primary THA while the studies reporting the results after SBTHA were limited.24,25 Because of associated comorbidities of anesthesia and the surgical technique, performing THA in obese patients was more difficult than that in normal patients, not to mention SBTHA, which could lead to more blood loss, even higher risk of complications compared to primary THA11,14 However, the effect of BMI on blood loss, transfusions as well as incidence of complications following SBTHA was still unknown.
To our best knowledge, the studies investigating the effect of BMI on blood loss in the setting of THA have been limited to just two published retrospective studies. Frish et al. divided patients undergoing primary THA into normal, overweight, and obese group on the base of BMI and compared the blood loss as well as transfusion rate among the three groups, revealing that patients with an elevated BMI had increased blood loss and decreased transfusion rate. Increased BMI lead to downward transfusion risk because of smaller percentage of blood loss in total blood volume. 12 Sayeed et al. 13 found that underweight patients had a greater risk for postoperative anemia compared to Ⅲ obese patients in primary THA, but he just enrolled underweight and Ⅲ obese patients . Our study firstly evaluated the relation of BMI and blood loos as well as transfusion following SBTHA. We found a similar trend with previous studies, that was to say, elevated BMI was associated with increased estimated blood volume, blood loss, and decreased transfusion rate.
Our previous study indicated that obesity could not increase blood loos following SBTKA 16 while we found that increased BMI contributed to more TBL following SBTHA in this study. The possible reason was that THA had significantly greater blood loss and transfusion risk than TKA, and patients undergoing THA was more sensitive to rising BMI.15,26
Whether elevated BMI is associated with increasing incidence of complications after THA has been the focus of debate. In the short term ( < 90 days), the relation of BMI and complications was still controversial. Gurunathan et al.
27
found the overweight and obese class II patients had a lower likelihood of developing overall, especially cardiac complications . In addition, Shohat et al.
28
demonstrated that the risk for infection increases gradually throughout the full range of BMI . However, more and more studies supported that BMI alone was not an independent risk factor for a higher complication rate and obesity could not lead to higher risk of complications .29–31 In the long term, after the analysis of nationwide billing data in Germany, Jeschke et al.
32
showed that elevated BMI could increase the risk of remotely 90 day complications and 1 year revision rates . Notably, above papers reached a consensus, which was that the complication risk will dramatically increase when the BMI was more than 40 kg/
We used Gross and Nadler formula to calculate blood loss in this study.21,22 Meanwhile, we add that if either reinfusion or allogeneic transfusion was performed, the TBL was equal to the loss calculated from the change in Hct plus the volume transfuse. So our calculating method is also similar to Mercuriali’s formula (calculated blood loss + transfused red blood cell), which is considered most suitable formula for comparable studies regarding blood loss in surgery in the research of Gibon and his colleagues. 33 In addition, the calculating method (Gross and Nadler formula) is widely used in other studies.26,34,35 Moreover, the calculating method is the same among the three groups, which is the basis of comparison. Therefore, we think the method to calculate blood loss in our study is suitable.
There were some limitations in the current study. First, the maximum of BMI in this study was only 33.99 kg/
In summary, Ⅰ obesity could increase perioperative blood loss but not increase transfusion risk in the setting of SBTHA. Conversely, obese and overweight patients maybe have lower transfusion need compared with normal patients because of more blood volume. In addition, obesity did not affect the incidence of complications.
Footnotes
Declaration of conflicting interests
The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
Funding
The author(s) disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article: This research was funded by the National Health and Family Planning Commission of the People’s Republic of China (CN) program (201,302,007).
Ethical approval
The study was a multicenter retrospective cohort study. The data was obtained from a multicenter database that was provided by 26 hospitals sponsored by the Chinese Health Ministry (201,302,007). This study was approved by the local institutional review board of West China Hospital, Sichuan University (2012-268).
Informed consent
Written informed consent (including patients’ details, images or videos) was obtained from all participants.
Data availability
Availability of data and materials The datasets used and/or analyzed during the current study are available from the corresponding author on reasonable request.
