June 2, 2022 — Over the past 10 years, the number of hip and knee replacements performed in Canada increased each year. With the emergence of the COVID-19 pandemic, many joint replacements — which are largely planned surgeries — were cancelled as health systems looked to free up hospital capacity. In 2020–2021, 20% fewer replacements were performed compared with the previous year, with hospitals across the country pausing and resuming planned surgeries as the COVID-19 waves emerged and waned.
Among the approximately 110,000 joint replacements performed in 2020–2021, more than 7,300 were performed as day surgery, representing a four-fold increase from the previous year. This shift in practice was likely accelerated as health systems looked for additional inpatient capacity during the pandemic.
The average hospital cost for these surgeries was $12,223, an increase compared with the previous year. In 2020–2021, more than $1.3 billion was spent on hospital costs (including physician costs and excluding rehabilitation), which was $109.8 million less than the previous year.
This year’s annual report presents findings on the impact of COVID-19 on hip and knee replacements in Canada, including jurisdictional results, as well as the latest available statistics on hospitalization trends, clinical information and risk factors for revision surgery. For the first time, it also includes results based on data collected directly from patients who had a hip or knee replacement. These patient-reported outcome measures (PROMs) provide information from the patient’s perspective and support a patient-centred approach to care.
Read the report to learn more.
Key findings
- In 2020–2021, 55,300 hip and 55,285 knee replacements were performed in Canada, which was 12.9% and 26.4% lower, respectively, compared with the number performed in 2019–2020. By jurisdiction, volume decreases ranged from -3.7% in New Brunswick to -35.9% in Saskatchewan.
- It is estimated that approximately 48,000 surgeries were not performed in the past 2 years, as would have been expected based on average annual volume increases observed before the pandemic.
- 6.6% of all joint replacements in 2020–2021 were performed as day surgeries, compared with 1.7% in 2019–2020.
- In 2020–2021, the top 3 reasons for revision (hips and knees combined) were infection (31.3%), aseptic loosening (15.0%) and instability (14.8%).
- Patients reported higher health outcome scores 1 year after hip and knee replacement surgery compared with before surgery (data from Ontario, Manitoba and Alberta). Most patients were satisfied with the outcome of their surgery; however, 7% of hip and 12% of knee replacement patients reported feeling neutral or dissatisfied with the outcome of their surgery after 1 year.
Featured material
Annual report
Explore the latest information on hip and knee replacements in Canada, including patient demographics, surgical statistics, costs, patient-reported outcomes, data tables and revision risk curves.