Outcome of Spinal Versus General Anesthesia in Revision Total Hip Arthroplasty: A Propensity Score-Matched Cohort Analysis

INTRODUCTION: Spinal anesthesia has been previously shown to offer improved patient outcomes compared with general anesthesia in revision total knee arthroplasty. This study aimed to evaluate the potential differences in perioperartive and postoperative outcomes in revision total hip arthroplasty (THA) between spinal or general anesthesia. METHODS: A total of 2,656 consecutive patients who underwent revision THA were evaluated. Propensity-score-adjusted multivariate logistic regression analyses were applied to control for intergroup variability and evaluate the differences in outcomes and complications with anesthesia type. RESULTS: Propensity score matching resulted in 1:1 matching with 265 patients in each anesthesia cohort. Multivariate analyses demonstrated that patients administered general anesthesia had a significantly longer procedure time (174.8 versus 161.3, P < 0.01), higher intraoperative (402.6 versus 305.5 mL, P < 0.01), and total perioperative blood loss (1802.2 versus 1,684.2 mL,P < 0.01). In addition, patients administered general anesthesia were found to have higher odds for two or more inhospital complications (odds ratio, 4.51, P < 0.01) and extended length of stay (odds ratio, 2.45, P = 0.02). DISCUSSION: Our study shows that propensity-matched patients who received spinal anesthesia for revision THA exhibited notable reduction in surgical time, perioperative blood loss, and complications compared with patients who received general anesthesia, suggesting that spinal anesthesia is a viable alternative to general anesthesia in revision THA.