Gold cheer for knee replacement surgery
2 min readPatna: Doctors at the city’s Paras HMRI Hospital have performed a gold knee replacement surgery on a 65-year-old patient from Gopalganj, which they claim is the first of its kind in Bihar and Jharkhand.
Vasudev Manjhi has got a knee implant made up of cobalt chromium (CoCr) just like the traditional implants but it is different in the sense that it has got seven layers of gold coating. The surgery was performed by the orthopaedic surgeon, Dr Nishikant Kumar and his team on April 24. According to Nishikant, the patient was able to walk a day after the surgery. The hospital is expected to release Vasudev on Sunday.
“The patient was suffering from severe osteo arthritis of the knee with chronic synovitis (inflammation around the knee joint). The patient was suitable to get a gold knee replacement surgery because he was suffering from a condition in which he was prone to infections and inflammation around the knee joint,” said the doctor.
He added: “The normal knee implant is made up of cobalt chromium but the implant which we used for Vasudev has seven layers of gold coating. It is not made of gold completely, rather it is gold plated. We have found allergic reaction among patients in which traditional cobalt chromium implants were used and this occurs owing to the presence of alloy – cobalt chromium – which also contains nickel. The nickel causes allergy.
“However, the allergic reaction can be found in a few cases. The seven-layer coating of gold acts as a barrier between the metal and the skin and this way, it prevents allergies and other reactions. Not all patients require this gold-plated implant.”
Director of the orthopaedics and trauma wing at Paras HMRI Dr John Mukhopadhyay said regular knee implants made of CoCr tend to release metal ions in the body. “These metal ions can cause inflammation and eventually can lead to infection and pain.”
The traditional cobalt chromium knee implants costs around Rs 60,000, while the one with seven layers of gold coating cost around Rs 75,000.
Courtesy: The Telegraph
