Despite Economic Times, U.S. Demand for Total Joint Replacement Remains Steady 2014 April 2, 2014
April 2, 2014
Original Article http://newsroom.aaos.org/media-resources/Press-releases/despite-economic-times-us-demand-for-total-joint-replacement-remains-steady.htm
ROSEMONT, Ill. A new study appearing in the April issue of the Journal of Bone and Joint Surgery(JBJS) showed that the economic downturns in the 2000s did not substantially influence the national growth trends for hip and knee arthroplasty in the United States. The new data support the authors’ existing projections – made in 2007 – that predicted a significant surge in demand for total joint replacement(TJR) through 2030.
Facing criticism that existing model projections of utilization of TJR did not take into account macroeconomic shifts such as recessions, researchers revisited the data adding the National Health Expenditure data as an independent variable. They conducted a historical trend analysis to compare the original projections with actual TJR rates through 2010 using data from the Nationwide Inpatient Sample (NIS) and used a linear regression model to calculate estimates through 2021 (the latest year for which the National Health Expenditure estimates are available).
The investigators found that the overall growth trend for the incidence of hip and knee arthroplasty, relative to the total U.S. population, was insensitive to economic downturns.
From 2009 to 2010, the total number of procedures increased by:
- 6.0 percent for primary total hip arthroplasty;
- 6.1 percent for primary total knee arthroplasty;
- 10.8 percent for revision total hip arthroplasty; and
- 13.5 percent for revision total knee arthroplasty.