Individual Gait Features Are Associated with Clinical Improvement After Total Knee Arthroplasty

Background: Over 20% of patients do not report clinically relevant pain relief or functional improvements after total knee arthroplasty (TKA). The aim of this study was to investigate the effect of demographics, pre-TKA knee-joint biomechanics, and postoperative changes in knee biomechanics on meaningful improvements in self-reported pain and function after TKA.

Methods: Forty-six patients underwent 3-dimensional gait analysis and completed the Western Ontario and McMaster Universities Osteoarthritis Index (WOMAC) questionnaire before and 1 year after TKA. Response to treatment in terms of pain relief and functional improvement ("pain and function responders") was defined as improvements in WOMAC scores that met minimal clinically important difference thresholds in the pain and function domains. Differences between responder and non-responder demographics, severity of the osteoarthritis as seen radiographically, and knee kinematics and kinetics before TKA were explored using the t test and Mann-Whitney U test. Correlations and regression models were used to examine demographics, baseline knee kinematics and kinetics, and post-TKA kinematic and kinetic improvements associated with being a pain responder and a function responder separately. Analyses were conducted using a hypothesis-driving approach.

Results: Of the 46 patients, 34 were pain responders and 36 were function responders. Preoperatively, both responder groups had a higher radiographic severity (Kellgren-Lawrence) grade (p = 0.03) and pain responders were more symptomatic according to their WOMAC score (p < 0.04). Less preoperative stance-phase flexion-extension angle range (p ≤ 0.03), lower preoperative stance-phase adduction (varus) angle magnitude (p = 0.01), and less postoperative reduction in the adduction angle magnitude (p ≤ 0.009) were independently associated with more self-reported improvement in pain and function.

Conclusions: Patients with a higher radiographic severity grade, with specific frontal and sagittal knee kinematic patterns during gait before TKA, and who demonstrated less reduction in frontal plane angles during gait after TKA had greater self-reported pain and function score improvements after standard TKA. Gait analysis may aid preoperative identification of kinematic subgroups associated with self-reported improvements after TKA, and provide evidence that may inform triaging, surgical planning, and expectation management strategies.

Level of evidence: Prognostic Level IV. See Instructions for Authors for a complete description of levels of evidence.