Thirty-five consecutive total hip arthroplasties in twenty-eight
patients were performed with use of cement and insertion of an autogenous
graft from the femoral head. Five patients (six hips) subsequently died or
were lost to follow-up. The results for the remaining twenty-three patients
(twenty-nine hips) were reviewed retrospectively at a mean of eleven years
(range, seven to seventeen years) after the operation. All of the grafts
united. The mean estimated coverage of the acetabular component by the
autogenous graft was 27 per cent (range, 15 to 45 per cent). Three sockets
(10 per cent) were revised because of symptomatic loosening without
infection at a mean of ten years (eight, ten, and twelve years) after the
index procedure. All three hips were found to have viable, bleeding bone in
the region of the remaining graft. An additional eight acetabular
components had a nonprogressive, asymptomatic, continuous radiolucent line
at the cement-bone interface. This finding was assumed to indicate
loosening of the socket, so the total prevalence of loosening was 38 per
cent (eleven of twenty-nine sockets). There was no significant difference
between the loose and the well fixed components in terms of the amount of
coverage by the graft (p > 0.2) or the method of fixation (p > 0.4).
There was no collapse or resorption of the graft that was of mechanical
consequence. Autogenous femoral-head bone-grafting is a useful technique
with a good potential for long-term success when the amount of coverage by
the graft is limited to less than 40 per cent of the surface of the
acetabular component.