• Ravi Bhandari, Pravakar Dawadi, Mohit Thapa Magar, Ritesh Sinha, Nirab Kayastha, Rajesh Pratap Shah, Bishnu Babu Thapa, and Sushil Rana Magar.
• Department of Orthopedics, Nepalese Army Institute of Health Sciences, Shree Birendra Hospital, Chhauni, Kathmandu, Nepal.
• JNMA J Nepal Med Assoc. 2021 Feb 28; 59 (234): 116-119.

IntroductionImplant removal surgery is one of the common surgical procedures done in orthopedics. Studies report that a major portion of orthopedic surgeries carried out in different institutions comprises implant removal procedures. This can be challenging in limited manpower and infrastructure availability scenarios, like in developing countries like Nepal. This study aims to study the prevalence of orthopedic implant removal procedures carried out among overall surgical procedures in the orthopedic department of a tertiary care center in Nepal.MethodsA descriptive cross-sectional study was performed on the medical records of the department of orthopedics of a tertiary care center after approval from the institutional review committee. The data included records from the starting of 2018 to the end of 2019. Data related to the number of implant removal procedures, types of implants, indications, fracture sites, anesthesia use, gender and age distribution were studied. Statistical Package for Social Sciences version 20 was used to study descriptive data.ResultsOut of 2557 orthopedic operations carried out in the study duration, 458 (17.91%) of implant removal procedures were done in the department. The most common age group was the young adult age group, 255 (55.68%). Medium-sized implants were the commonly removed ones, 337 (73.58%). Elective procedures were the most common indication, 369 (80.57%).ConclusionsImplant removal procedures cover a major fraction of overall orthopedic operations carried out by the department, most of which are elective procedures. In limited-resource settings, this can be challenging, and a proper evaluation with counseling could be done before implant removal surgery.

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