ADVANCED CEMENT TECHNIQUE IMPROVES FIXATION IN ELBOW ARTHROPLASTY

An in vitro study was conducted to assess the efficacy of advanced cem enting techniques in the fixation of the humeral stem in elbow arthrop lasty, Sixteen fresh frozen cadaveric distal humeri were prepared to a ccept an acrylic sham humeral stem, Conventional cementing technique u sing doughy cement manually inserted and packed was performed in 8 spe cimens, The advanced cementing technique, consisting of canal irrigati on, brushing and drying with gauze, canal plugging, and low viscosity cement pressurization with a delivery system was performed in the othe r specimens, All humeri subsequently were sectioned into 10 mm thick s ections, photographed, and digitized to quantify the perimeter and are a of the stem, cement mantle, corticocancellous junction, and cement v oids, The degree of cement filling, determined from the area fraction of cement to the total available area within the corticocancellous jun ction, was significantly greater in the advanced group compared with t he conventional group, Mechanical assessment of the specimens consiste d of a push out load to failure test of the cement mantle from bone, F or all locations in the distal humerus, the failure load and failure s tress in the advanced group was significantly greater than the convent ional group. It is concluded that development of an effective cement r estrictor and application of advanced cement techniques in vivo should improve the initial. fixation of the humeral component and may decrea se the incidence of aseptic loosening associated with elbow arthroplas ty.