Total knee arthroplasty: technical planning and surgical aspects.

This chapter has outlined the considerations that must be made preoperatively--assessing the difficulty of the procedure at hand, intelligently selecting the prosthesis to be used, planning the patient's alignment, and understanding the instrumentation to be used. Intraoperatively the surgeon must work with an adequate, yet careful, surgical exposure, and a safe and effective saw technique. In addition, the surgeon must understand and manage any major, fixed deformity and ensure proper patellar tracking.