Total knee replacements: A race to the bottom (KevinMD)
A total knee replacement is a very common operation and more than 700,000 of them are performed each year in the United States. With a mean cost of about $16,000 each, in 2011 we spent over eleven billion dollars paying for knee replacements. Projections are that, by 2030, we’ll be doing 3.5 million per year. The operation has great results and patients generally do well during and after their surgery.
Anesthetic care has improved dramatically over time. Whereas initially patients who had a knee replaced would be given large doses of narc...
The Orthopedics Industry 