Clinical Review

The Effect of Humeral Inclination on Range of Motion in Reverse Total Shoulder Arthroplasty: A Systematic Review

Am J Orthop. 2016 May;45(4):E174-E179

References

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The results of the current study were similar in that both the 135° and 155° prosthesis showed improvements in forward elevation following surgery, and the 135° group showed a significantly greater gain in external rotation than the 155° group. A significant component of shoulder function and patient satisfaction following RTSA is active ROM. However, this variable has not explicitly been evaluated in the literature until now. The clinical significance of this finding is unclear. Patients with adequate external rotation prior to surgery likely would not see a functional difference between prostheses, while those patients who were borderline on a functional amount of external rotation would see a clinically significant benefit with the 135° prosthesis. Studies have shown that the 135° prosthesis is more anatomic than the 155°, and this could explain the difference seen in ROM outcomes between the 2 prostheses.¹⁹ Ladermann and colleagues²² recently created and evaluated a 3-dimensional computer model to evaluate possible differences between the 135° and 155° prosthesis. The authors found a significant increase in external rotation of the 135° compared to the 155°, likely related to a difference in acromiohumeral distance as well as inlay vs onlay humeral trays between the 2 prostheses. The results of this study parallel the computer model, thereby validating these experimental results.

It is important to understand what the minimum functional ROM of the shoulder is (in other words, the ROM necessary to complete activities of daily living (ADLs).²³ Namdari and colleagues²⁴ used motion analysis software to evaluate the shoulder ROM necessary to complete 10 different ADLs, including combing hair, washing the back of the opposite shoulder, and reaching a shelf above their head without bending their elbow in 20 patients with a mean age of 29.2 years. They found that patients required 121° ± 6.7° of flexion, 46° ± 5.3° of extension, 128° ± 7.9° of abduction, 116° ± 9.1° of cross-body adduction, 59° ± 10° of external rotation with the arm 90° abducted, and 102° ± 7.7° of internal rotation with the arm at the side (external rotation with the arm at the side was not well defined).²⁴ Hence, while abduction and forward elevation seem comparable, the results from the current study do raise concerns about the amount of external rotation obtained following RTSA as it relates to a patients’ ability to perform ADLs, specifically in the 155° prosthesis, as the average postoperative external rotation in this group was 20.5°. Therefore, based on the results of this study, it appears that, while both the 135° and 155° RTSA prostheses provide similar gain in forward elevation and abduction ROM as well as overall forward elevation and abduction, the 135° prosthesis provides significantly more external rotation with the arm at the side than the 155° prosthesis.

Limitations

Although this study attempted to look at all studies that reported active ROM in patients following a RTSA, and 2 authors performed the search, there is a possibility that some studies were missed, introducing study selection bias. Furthermore, the mean follow-up was over 3 years following surgery, but the minimum follow-up requirement for studies to be included was only 12 months. Hence, this transfer bias introduces the possibility that the patient’s ROM would have changed had they been followed for a standard period of time. There are many variables that come into play in evaluating ROM, and although the study attempted to control for these, there are some that could not be controlled for due to lack of reporting by some studies. Glenosphere size and humeral retroversion were not recorded, as they were not reliably reported in all studies, so motion outcomes based on these variables was not evaluated. Complications and clinical outcomes were not assessed in this review and as such, conclusions regarding these variables cannot be drawn from this study. Finally, indications for surgery were not reliably reported in the studies included in this paper, so differences may have existed between surgical indications of the 135° and 155° groups that could have affected outcomes.

Conclusion

Patients who receive a 135° RTSA gain significantly more external rotation from pre- to postsurgery and have an overall greater amount of external rotation than patients who receive a 155° prosthesis. Both groups show improvements in forward elevation, external rotation, and abduction following surgery.