Knee replacement patients may not need to wait for up to two weeks after surgery to shower, according to a study published in the Journal of Arthroplasty.
The study included 32 patients who underwent knee replacement surgery to treat bone-on-bone arthritis. Researchers compared patients who were allowed to shower two days after surgery with patients who had to wait 10 to 14 days. Sixteen patients were randomly assigned to the early-shower group and 16 were assigned to the delayed-shower group.
Here are three notes:
1. Post-surgery, 94 percent of the early-shower group and 81 percent of the delayed-shower group reported that early showering was important to them, and that they would prefer to do so if given the choice.
2. No differences were found between the early-shower and delayed-shower groups.
3. No patient in either group experienced an infection.
"What is needed now is a larger-scale study that can evaluate if early versus delayed wound cleaning has any effect on surgical site wound infection risk for total knee arthroplasty," study authors wrote.