The relationship between cement fatigue damage and implant surface finish in proximal femoral prostheses.

The majority of cemented femoral hip replacements fail as a consequence of loosening. One design feature that may affect loosening rates is implant surface finish. To determine whether or not surface finish effects fatigue damage accumulation in a bone cement mantle, we developed an experimental model of the implanted proximal femur that allows visualisation of damage growth in the cement layer. Five matte surface and five polished surface stems were tested. Pre-load damage and damage after two million cycles was measured. Levels of pre-load (shrinkage) damage were the same for both matte and polished stems; furthermore damage for matte vs. polished stems was not significantly different after two million cycles. This was due to the large variability in damage accumulation rates. Finite element analysis showed that the stress is higher for the polished (assumed debonded) stem, and therefore we must conclude that either the magnitude of the stress increase is not enough to appreciably increase the damage accumulation rate or, alternatively, the polished stem does not debond immediately from the cement. Significantly (P=0.05) more damage was initiated in the lateral cement compared to the medial cement for both kinds of surface finish. It was concluded that, despite the higher cement stresses with debonded stems, polished prostheses do not provoke the damage accumulation failure scenario.

Minimum solid area models applied to the prediction of Young's modulus for cancellous bone.

In developing models for the mechanical behavior of cancellous bone, accurate prediction of Young's modulus as a function of the pore fraction and morphology is a requirement. Previous workers have suggested models which provide good statistical fits, but most of these models are highly idealized, with no treatment of the actual morphology of the porosity. In the field of engineering ceramics, simple minimum solid area models have been developed over the past four decades to describe the mechanical properties of porous structural ceramics. This paper applies these models to data for cancellous bone, and it is shown that one, developed specifically for high porosity materials, gives realistic predictions of tissue modulus and a good statistical fit to well-established data. This model should prove to be useful in biomechanical analyses involving cancellous bone tissue.

An experimental study of damage accumulation in cemented hip prostheses.

OBJECTIVE: To develop a methodology to characterize the pattern of crack initiation and damage accumulation in intramedullary fixated cemented prostheses. DESIGN: An experimental physical model of intramedullary fixation was developed which both represents the implant structure and permits monitoring of fatigue crack growth. BACKGROUND: Many joint replacement prostheses are fixed into the medullary cavity of bones using a poly(methylmethacrylate) 'bone cement', which forms a mantle around the prosthesis and locks it to the bone. The endurance of the replacement is, to a great extent, determined by the mechanical durability of the cement and the implant interfaces under cyclic stresses generated by dynamic loading. The cement mantle is subjected to complex multiaxial stresses which vary in particular distribution depending on the prosthesis design. METHODS: Damage accumulation is reported in terms of the number of cracks, the location of cracks, and the rate of crack growth. RESULTS: The results clearly show the nature of damage accumulation in the cement mantle, and that many of the cracks which propagate within the cement mantle are related to cement porosity. CONCLUSION: This study gives experimental evidence to support the hypothesis of a damage accumulation failure scenario in cemented hip reconstructions. RELEVANCE: Cementing is the most popular technique for the fixation of joint replacement prosthesis. However, the sequence of events leading to the failure of cemented fixation is not fully understood. In this paper it is shown that damage accumulation can be directly monitored in an experimental model of cemented intramedullary fixation.