Total knee replacement - what kind of criteria do people use to decide when to do replacement?

Pain/disability: When to have a knee replacement has to be an individualized decision. The patient's age, health, ability to undergo a lengthy surgery, degree of pain along with the amount of disability and loss of function are all major factors that have to be considered. The severity of arthritis on a x-ray should not be the primary factor, as many with severe x-ray changes have little pain and good function.

The basics are:: 1. Pain not relieved anymore by non-surgical measures. 2. Instability with walking: the fear or feeling of giving way when walking. 3. Lifestyle change: when patients start subtracting things they like to do from their lives because of their knee pain or instability. 4. Xrays that show moderate to severe cartilage loss in the joint spaces from arthritis.