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Before the Surgery
You will first go to a surgical pre-operative room. After changing into a gown and relaxing on the hospital bed, a nurse will check your vital signs and place a peripheral IV in your arm. This IV is used to give you fluids and medications during the surgery. You will also receive an antibiotic through the IV prior to the procedure.
Next, your surgical team andanesthesiologistwill come to greet you. They may briefly review the surgery with you and ask you to sign additional consent forms.
Thetype of anesthesiayou and your healthcare provider chose during your pre-operative consultation—general anesthesia, epidural or spinal anesthesia, orregional nerve block—will have no effect on your surgeon’s ability to perform the knee replacement.
During the Surgery
Knee replacement surgery generally proceeds with the following steps:
Once the surgery is done, the anesthesia medication will be stopped and your breathing tube will be removed.
After the Surgery
After your knee replacement surgery, you will be taken to a recovery room where a nurse will monitor your vital signs and manage your pain.
Once your vitals are stable and your pain is under control (usually within a few hours), you will be taken to a hospital room to recover more. Of note, in select circumstances, a patient may go home the same day as their procedure (this is not typical, but becoming more popular).
When recovering in the hospital, your surgical team will give you a blood thinner (anticoagulant) and compression boots to help preventblood clotsin your legs.For postoperative pain control, your surgeon will likely inject a combination of local anesthetic agents directly into the knee and surrounding skin while closing your incision while you are still intubated in the operating room. This can alleviate pain for several hours after surgery.
In other cases, if you received a regional nerve block, your anesthesiologist will often leave in a small catheter, or tube, that slowly releases numbing medication around the nerves surrounding the knee to provide comfort for days after your surgery. Additional injections through the catheter may be given if more pain control is needed.
Aphysical therapistwill also come to visit you in your hospital room to teach you various exercises.
Upon being discharged from the hospital, you will be given various post-operative instructions to follow at home.
These instructions may include:
A Word From Verywell
While much happens during knee replacement surgery, one can argue that the real work comes after the procedure is done. Success is due, in large part, to therehabilitation that follows. If you expect a good result from knee replacement surgery, you must be an active rehab participant.
Can You Kneel After a Knee Replacement?
7 SourcesVerywell Health uses only high-quality sources, including peer-reviewed studies, to support the facts within our articles. Read oureditorial processto learn more about how we fact-check and keep our content accurate, reliable, and trustworthy.Bratzler DW, Dellinger EP, Olsen KM et al.Clinical practice guidelines for antimicrobial prophylaxis in surgery.Am J Health Syst Pharm. 2013 Feb 1;70(3):195-283. doi:10.2146/ajhp120568American Academy of Orthopedic Surgeons.Total Knee Replacement. Reviewed June 2020.Wang K, Sun H, Zhang K, et al.Better outcomes are associated with cementless fixation in primary total knee arthroplasty in young patients: A systematic review and meta-analysis of randomized controlled trials.Medicine (Baltimore).2020 Jan;99(3):e18750. doi:10.1097/MD.0000000000018750Lazic S, Boughton O, Kellett CF, Kader DF, Villet L, Rivière C.Day-case surgery for total hip and knee replacement. How safe and effective is it?EFORT Open Rev.2018 Apr; 3(4): 130–135. doi:10.1302/2058-5241.3.170031American Academy of Orthopedic Surgeons.Osteoarthritis of the Knee: Clinical Practice Guideline on Treatment of Osteoarthritis of the Knee (2nd Edition). 2020.Johns Hopkins Medicine.Knee Replacement Surgery Procedure. 2020.Forster R, Stewart M.Anticoagulants (extended duration) for prevention of venous thromboembolism following total hip or knee replacement or hip fracture repair.Cochrane Database Syst Rev.2016 Mar 30;3:CD004179. doi:10.1002/14651858.CD004179.pub2
7 Sources
Verywell Health uses only high-quality sources, including peer-reviewed studies, to support the facts within our articles. Read oureditorial processto learn more about how we fact-check and keep our content accurate, reliable, and trustworthy.Bratzler DW, Dellinger EP, Olsen KM et al.Clinical practice guidelines for antimicrobial prophylaxis in surgery.Am J Health Syst Pharm. 2013 Feb 1;70(3):195-283. doi:10.2146/ajhp120568American Academy of Orthopedic Surgeons.Total Knee Replacement. Reviewed June 2020.Wang K, Sun H, Zhang K, et al.Better outcomes are associated with cementless fixation in primary total knee arthroplasty in young patients: A systematic review and meta-analysis of randomized controlled trials.Medicine (Baltimore).2020 Jan;99(3):e18750. doi:10.1097/MD.0000000000018750Lazic S, Boughton O, Kellett CF, Kader DF, Villet L, Rivière C.Day-case surgery for total hip and knee replacement. How safe and effective is it?EFORT Open Rev.2018 Apr; 3(4): 130–135. doi:10.1302/2058-5241.3.170031American Academy of Orthopedic Surgeons.Osteoarthritis of the Knee: Clinical Practice Guideline on Treatment of Osteoarthritis of the Knee (2nd Edition). 2020.Johns Hopkins Medicine.Knee Replacement Surgery Procedure. 2020.Forster R, Stewart M.Anticoagulants (extended duration) for prevention of venous thromboembolism following total hip or knee replacement or hip fracture repair.Cochrane Database Syst Rev.2016 Mar 30;3:CD004179. doi:10.1002/14651858.CD004179.pub2
Verywell Health uses only high-quality sources, including peer-reviewed studies, to support the facts within our articles. Read oureditorial processto learn more about how we fact-check and keep our content accurate, reliable, and trustworthy.
Bratzler DW, Dellinger EP, Olsen KM et al.Clinical practice guidelines for antimicrobial prophylaxis in surgery.Am J Health Syst Pharm. 2013 Feb 1;70(3):195-283. doi:10.2146/ajhp120568American Academy of Orthopedic Surgeons.Total Knee Replacement. Reviewed June 2020.Wang K, Sun H, Zhang K, et al.Better outcomes are associated with cementless fixation in primary total knee arthroplasty in young patients: A systematic review and meta-analysis of randomized controlled trials.Medicine (Baltimore).2020 Jan;99(3):e18750. doi:10.1097/MD.0000000000018750Lazic S, Boughton O, Kellett CF, Kader DF, Villet L, Rivière C.Day-case surgery for total hip and knee replacement. How safe and effective is it?EFORT Open Rev.2018 Apr; 3(4): 130–135. doi:10.1302/2058-5241.3.170031American Academy of Orthopedic Surgeons.Osteoarthritis of the Knee: Clinical Practice Guideline on Treatment of Osteoarthritis of the Knee (2nd Edition). 2020.Johns Hopkins Medicine.Knee Replacement Surgery Procedure. 2020.Forster R, Stewart M.Anticoagulants (extended duration) for prevention of venous thromboembolism following total hip or knee replacement or hip fracture repair.Cochrane Database Syst Rev.2016 Mar 30;3:CD004179. doi:10.1002/14651858.CD004179.pub2
Bratzler DW, Dellinger EP, Olsen KM et al.Clinical practice guidelines for antimicrobial prophylaxis in surgery.Am J Health Syst Pharm. 2013 Feb 1;70(3):195-283. doi:10.2146/ajhp120568
American Academy of Orthopedic Surgeons.Total Knee Replacement. Reviewed June 2020.
Wang K, Sun H, Zhang K, et al.Better outcomes are associated with cementless fixation in primary total knee arthroplasty in young patients: A systematic review and meta-analysis of randomized controlled trials.Medicine (Baltimore).2020 Jan;99(3):e18750. doi:10.1097/MD.0000000000018750
Lazic S, Boughton O, Kellett CF, Kader DF, Villet L, Rivière C.Day-case surgery for total hip and knee replacement. How safe and effective is it?EFORT Open Rev.2018 Apr; 3(4): 130–135. doi:10.1302/2058-5241.3.170031
American Academy of Orthopedic Surgeons.Osteoarthritis of the Knee: Clinical Practice Guideline on Treatment of Osteoarthritis of the Knee (2nd Edition). 2020.
Johns Hopkins Medicine.Knee Replacement Surgery Procedure. 2020.
Forster R, Stewart M.Anticoagulants (extended duration) for prevention of venous thromboembolism following total hip or knee replacement or hip fracture repair.Cochrane Database Syst Rev.2016 Mar 30;3:CD004179. doi:10.1002/14651858.CD004179.pub2
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