Recent Advances in Orthopaedics

Recent advances in orthopaedics

K.C. Mehtaa,b,c,*

Medical science, particularly in Orthopaedics has pro-gressed and seen tremendous revolutionary changes overthe last few decades. Starting from an era of no surgery,it has refined to minimally invasive surgeries and keyholesurgeries in almost all subspecialties of Orthopaedics.

With advancements in technology and a better under-standing of various diseases have significantly contributedto an ideal management of different orthopaedic conditionsand ailments.

The current issue of Apollo Medicine refers to the‘Recent Advances in Orthopaedics’ that deals with someof the very important developments in these areas.

Joint replacement surgery has been a boon and gift to thehuman race, in form of mobility and pain free life forpatients suffering from arthritis. Hundreds of thousands ofjoints are replaced in different parts of the world with stateof art technology. It is one of the commonest proceduresperformed in Orthopaedics all over the world.

Knee and Hip replacement surgeries have a long andproven track record of success. Knee replacement surgeryusing a special surgical technique as discussed by Mehtaet al (Chandra Knee Clinic & Apollo Hospitals Interna-tional, Ahmedabad) in this issue highlights the advantagesof minimally invasive surgery with good range of move-ment without the help of any kind of physiotherapist’sassistance after the surgery.

Knee problems in terms of patients suffering from severepain and reduced mobility have increased fourfold, due toincrease in average life span of the Indian patients in lastfive decades due to improved medical facilities in post-inde-pendence era. This has lead to increase in the number of kneereplacement surgeries. Vaishya et al have highlighted the

‘pain’ as the fifth vital sign and discussed the role of painand its management in knee replacement.

Spinal surgery is now being done by exclusive special-ists, which had really improved the results due to betterknowledge and focus on the problems particularly relatedto this speciality. Minimally invasive spinal surgery hasbeen beneficial to patients in terms of reduced post-oppain, reduced blood loss, early functional recovery, shorterhospital stay, etc. as discussed by Jaiswal et al.

Shoulder problems have always been challenging tosolve, but with the newer technology and advancements,there has been improvement in the results in terms of func-tional recovery. In India, to take on shoulder problems asa super speciality branch, still there is lot of scope anda long way ahead to go for. Banerjee et al have highlightedvarious factors to address the problem of shoulder insta-bility, which can be addressed either by exercises orsurgery. Evaluation of the efficacy of arthroscopic releaseof anterior capsule in patients with idiopathic adhesive cap-sulitis, with results providing excellent functional outcomehas been presented by Kar et al in this issue.

The issue includes other rare and instructional casereports of the role of prosthetic replacement in managementof communited radial head fractures (Reddy et al) andoccurrence of the Giant osteoid osteoma of the tibial shaft(Vaishya et al).

Makroo et al have shared an interesting hospital experi-ence in relation to the use of predonated autologous bloodtransfusion in an elective orthopaedic surgery.

I’m sure that this issue of Apollo Medicine on RecentAdvances in Orthopaedics would be interesting, instructiveand very much informative to all the readers.

aChief Knee Surgeon and Director, Chandra Knee Clinics, bDirector, Chandra Knee Foundation, cGroup Director, Knee Programme, Apollo Hospi-tals Internationals, Ahmedabad, India.*Apollo Hospitals Internationals, Ahmedabad, India. email: chandrakneeclinic@hotmail.com

Copyright � 2012, Indraprastha Medical Corporation Ltd. All rights reserved.http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.apme.2012.10.003

Apollo Medicine 2012 DecemberVolume 9, Number 4; p. 288 Editorial

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