Patient experiences after surgically treated periprosthetic knee fracture in the distal femur – an explorative qualitative study
Bibliographic record
Abstract
BACKGROUND: Periprosthetic knee fractures (PPKF) following total knee arthroplasty (TKA) are rare, but represents a potentially devastating complication. A significant gap in understanding patient experiences related to the surgical treatment and recovery process remains. OBJECTIVE: The aim of the study was to explore patients' experiences 3-4 months after surgical treatment of a PPKF in the distal femur. METHOD: This exploratory qualitative study employed semi-structured, open-ended interviews with patients who had undergone surgical treatment for PPKF in the distal femur. Patients were recruited during hospitalization or at follow-up visits, with all approached individuals consenting to participate. Interviews were conducted three to four months post-surgery and data were analyzed thematically. RESULTS: Nine patients were interviewed between spring 2023 and spring 2024. The analysis yielded three themes: 1) Patient expectations of the recovery process, 2) Patient concerns - and consequently a desire for follow-up and information, and 3) The impact of recovery on independence and social life. Each theme was further illuminated with subthemes. CONCLUSION: This study highlights the major challenges of recovering from PPKFs in the distal femur, including physical pain, psychological stress, and social disruption. Unlike elective TKAs, the sudden nature of PPKFs leaves patients unprepared for the lengthy recovery process, which often leads to frustration and isolation. Dependence on family for daily tasks can intensify the feeling of being a burden. To enhance patients' recovery experiences and outcomes, clear communication and realistic expectations are essential in addressing these issues.
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How this classification was reachedexpand
Full frame distilled prediction
Teacher imitationNot calibrated prevalence, not ground truth. Human validation pending. Learned from the 10,348 direct Codex labels and 10,348 direct Gemma labels. Candidate is the union of thresholded teacher heads; consensus is their intersection. These outputs are machine_predicted_unvalidated and are not human labels or direct frontier model labels.
Codex and Gemma teacher scores by category
| Category | Codex | Gemma |
|---|---|---|
| Metaresearch | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (narrow) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Meta-epidemiology (broad) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Bibliometrics | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Science and technology studies | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Scholarly communication | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Open science | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Research integrity | 0.000 | 0.000 |
| Insufficient payload (model declined to judge) | 0.000 | 0.000 |
Machine scores (provisional)
The two teacher heads of the student model, read on this work. A score orders the frame for review; it never asserts a category, and the validation status ships verbatim with every row.
Baseline scores from an immature model (maturity gate not passed, 7 training rounds). Scores rank; they never assert a category.
score_only:v0-immature-baseline · verbatim from the scoring run: score_only means the number may rank works, and no category label ships from itClassification
machine, unvalidatedMachine predicted; a candidate call from one teacher head, not a consensus.
How this classification was reached, model by model and score by score, is at the end of the page under "How this classification was reached".