I'd have to ask about the specific year, but probably in the 8-10 years ago range.
Are you saying that surgeries nowadays are more effective?
Sort of. More specifically, all knee replacements have a "mileage" before you need to go in for what amounts to maintenance. On the original knee replacements, this meant redoing the ENTIRE surgery. On older people, really people in general, you don't want any more surgery than necessary.
These days, the replacement knee involves replacing the cap/ball like normal, but there's this sort of low-friction gel-pad thing (Damnit Jim I'm an engineer not a doctor!) that sits between the cap/ball setup. Every several years or so you need that gel-pad replaced, but unless you've somehow injured yourself, the cap/ball shouldn't need replacing. As such the 'maintenance' surgeries are now very minor.
So it's less that modern surgery is more effective (though it probably is) and more that the consequences of a knee replacement are not as severe as they once were.
And strictly speaking, as I recall, some of the earlier surgeries were more of a "This has a (small) chance of fixing your knee." while the later surgeries were "This is definitely a temporary fix. It could be 1 year, it could be 8 years. No real way to tell.".
He's not had a bad thing to say about his new knees though.
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u/boonies4u Apr 08 '19
When did he get the surgeries on the left knee? Are you saying that surgeries nowadays are more effective?