Long-term outcome of vascularized iliac bone grafting for osteonecrosis of femoral head: A retrospective study with 17-year follow-up.

AIMS

This study aims to investigate the long-term results of vascularized iliac bone grafting (VIBG) for osteonecrosis of the femoral head (ONFH). The primary outcome is the long-term survivorship of VIBG, using conversion to total hip arthroplasty as an end-point. Secondly, this study will also analyse the patient or disease factors influencing the long-term survivorship of VIBG.

METHODS

Forty-two patients (50 hips) underwent VIBG for ONFH in our institute between September 1995 and November 2013. Only patients with a follow-up of at least 5 years were included. The risk factors, surgical complications and VIBG survivorship were recorded. The stage of ONFH was classified according to the Ficat staging of the pre-operative radiographs. VIBG was only performed to patients with ONFH of Ficat stage II and stage III. Patients with hip arthritis (Ficat stage IV) did not receive VIBG and thus excluded from the study. Long-term survivorship of VIBG is measured by conversion to total hip arthroplasty.

RESULTS

Twenty-eight hips (56%) had surviving VIBG for the duration of follow-up. The overall mean graft survival was 12.2 ± 7.8 years (0.4-24.0). Steroid and alcohol-induced osteonecrosis were more predominant in the graft-failure group, which had a hazard ratio of 2.33 and 2.07 respectively for graft failure ( = 0.047). In terms of complication, there was one case of groin wound infection which required surgical debridement.

CONCLUSION

At a long-term follow-up of 17 years, our results showed that VIBG is effective in treating patients with pre-collapse (Ficat Stage II) and early post-collapse (Ficat stage III) in ONFH. Alcoholics and patients with steroid are at a higher risk of graft failure, so VIBG should be performed cautiously in these patients. VIBG is an intermediate operation until osteoarthritis sets in, either by the progression of ONFH or natural degenerative change.