• Jia-Wang Zhu, Tong-Fu Wang, De-Sheng Chen, and Lei Lei.
• Department of Sports Medicine and Arthroscopy, Tianjin Hospital of Tianjin University, Tianjin, China.
• Arch Orthop Trauma Surg. 2024 Aug 1; 144 (8): 361536243615-3624.

PurposeThis systematic review and meta-analysis aimed to evaluate the safety of outpatient and inpatient Unicompartmental Knee Arthroplasty (UKA) based on the incidence of adverse events.MethodA systematic search of the literature was performed in October 2022 on PubMed, Web of Science, Cochrane library, and Embase. The Meta package for R was used to perform the meta-analysis.ResultFive studies with a total of 26,301 patients were included. 5813 patients (22.1%) were treated with outpatient UKA, and 20,488 patients (77.9%) were treated with inpatient UKA. There were no statistically significant differences in the incidence of total complications (RR = 1.36, 95% CI = 0.64-2.89, Z = 0.79, P = 0.43), readmission (RR = 1.02, 95% CI = 0.40-2.60, Z = 0.05, P = 0.96), and venous thrombosis (RR = 1.43, 95% CI = 0.96-2.11, Z = 1.78, P = 0.08). Incidence rates were lower in outpatient UKA regarding urinary tract infection (RR = 1.48, 95% CI = 1.07-2.04, Z = 2.40, P = 0.02), pulmonary embolus (RR = 7.48, 95% CI = 1.80-31.17, Z = 2.76, P < 0.01), and transfusion (RR = 2.77, 95% CI = 1.63-4.71, Z = 3.78, P < 0.01).ConclusionIn summary, outpatient UKA shows lower incidences of hospital-acquired complications such urinary tract infection, pulmonary embolus, and transfusion. It's worth noting that the incidences of total complications, readmission, and venous thrombosis in outpatient UKA were not higher than the incidences of inpatient UKA, suggestting that outpatient UKA can be considered a safe alternative to inpatient UKA.© 2024. The Author(s).

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