ArticleJournal of orthopaedics2025
Environmental impact of TKA: Waste audit of hospital operating room compared to ambulatory surgery center.
Article in Journal of orthopaedics, 2025. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 3 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
What it found
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
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Who cites it
3 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it.
- Quantifying the environmental footprint of primary hip and knee arthroplasty: a systematic review and pooled-analysis of waste generation and carbon emissions.International orthopaedics · 2026Pooled it
- Waste Generation in Pediatric Orthopaedic Hardware Removal Surgery.Journal of the Pediatric Orthopaedic Society of North America · 2026Article
- The Environmental Impact of Short-Stay Total Shoulder Arthroplasty.JB & JS open accessArticle
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
6 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
Introduction: The implications of global warming are ever increasing in today's society. As the number of total knee arthroplasties (TKA) performed in the USA increases annually, the total waste produced from them will proportionally increase. This study hopes to quantify and compare the amount of waste created by a TKA in a hospital operating room (OR) and ambulatory surgery center (ASC) to evaluate for any differences in the amount and types of waste created. Methods: Waste audits were performed on 10 TKAs both at hospital OR and ASC OR. Waste was organized into 6 categories: normal solid waste, recyclable plastics, biohazard waste, laundered linens, sharps, and polypropylene blue sterile wrap. Weight and volume for each waste stream were recorded using a digital scale and ruler. Results: The total mass of waste produced was higher in hospital based TKAs than in the ASC cases (17.3 kg vs. 14.0 kg, p-value = 0.0028). There was significantly more mass of sterile, normal, and sharps waste at the hospital-based cases. Sterile waste was the largest contributor to the mass of waste in both settings. No difference existed in volume of waste between the hospital and ASC cases (305,866 cm Discussion: TKAs in both settings produce a large amount of waste. Performing TKAs at ASCs could be used to lower the amount of waste produced, resulting in long term benefits to both the environment and the healthcare system.
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Registered trials
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