Abstract
Postoperative leg swelling after a total knee replacement is common complaint amongst patients.
We studied leg swelling by constructing a novel, simple and cost water volumeter. A pilot study was conducted on 15 volunteers by two observers and each observer took a total of three readings.
The mean intraobserver variation was 0.2 percent and mean interobserver variation was 0.3 percent, indicating a highly acceptable level of accuracy.
The water volumeterwas then used in a randomized prospective study was conducted to determine the relationship between postoperative leg swelling and Fraxiparine, a low molecular weight heparin.
From the period of 1st January 2000 till 31th October 2000, a total of 36 patients were enrolled in the study. 18 patients in the study group received fraxiparine and 18 patients in the control group did not.
The leg volume was measured preoperatively and on postoperative days 5, 7 and 10.
We found that both groups developed maximum swelling at postoperative day 5 and this decreased to almost normal at day 10. However the fraxiparine group was statistically less swollen (4%) than the control group (10%) on day 5 and also on day 7 (−0.2% vs 7%). These findings were independent of whether the patient underwent bilateral or unilateral surgery. We conclude that low molecular weight heparins are effective in reducing postoperative leg swelling in total knee replacement.
The abstracts were prepared by Professor Jegan Krishnan. Correspondence should be addressed to him at the Flinders Medical Centre, Bedford Park 5047, Australia.
