Is Dental Clearance Required before a Knee Replacement?

Hello @dmjohnstone, Welcome to Connect. My Mayo Clinic surgeon didn't require me to get a dental clearance before I had my right knee replacement surgery. I think it depends on who is doing the surgery. Here's some information from Dec 2019.

"Conclusion:
With an aging population, the number of total joint arthroplasties is likely to continue growing. Periprosthetic infection remains a great concern and quality improvement problem despite improvements in sterile and prophylactic techniques. There is little evidence to support universal dental clearance before TJA, even for higher risk patients. There remains a need for future research to elucidate the mechanism of periprosthetic infections and more robust analysis of patients with high risk dental pathologies to help guide interventions."
-- Impact of dental clearance on total joint arthroplasty: A systematic review
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6937426/

Is your surgeon requesting a dental clearance before doing your knee replacement?

Not that i know of. My surgery is feb 10 . I will be doing pre op appointments on 26th of this month so i will find out. Ty for the information

Before/after my recent TKRs, no clearance was required. However, my surgeon directed for that a certain time period before, and then after, surgeries no dental work be done without an antibiotic they would prescribe. Just check with your surgical team or nurse navigator.

I don’t write this to scare anyone just share my life story. I had my second TKR about a year an a half ago. I had my semi-annual dental appointment approximately a month before my surgery. They did not do X-rays. First week after surgery a tooth broke & part of old filling came out; I discussed situation with my Surgeon. He was very concerned about the possibility of infection or abscess sending infection to new TKR. Usually they don’t want you to have dental work for approximately three months after TKR. It was a lot of discussion between me my dentist and my surgeon. It was two weeks of great tension for me. Finally found a Dentist that was willing to do the repair. It was risky no matter what I chose to do. Everything worked out well, thank you Lord! I freely admit that I am more concerned about TKR infection than most people. Probably because my Dad was one of the rare cases that didn’t work out as they usually do. My Dad had a TKR on his right leg and six months later was forced, because of pain he was forced have right hip replacement. Rehab was taking longer in the hospital than with the TKR. Dad had mentioned to me that he was having pain behind the TKR. I mentioned to the staff. He had also developed a blister on the same leg, another big warning sign. A few days later they sent him to a rehab center. That had a flu outbreak there a couple of days later. Dad started running a temp. They diagnosed the flu. A day later they had to rush him to ER. They did an x-ray noticed a little heat and pinkness around TKR and we’re about to sent him back to Rehab Center. I asked for blood work to be done before they sent him back. Later found out I should have asked for blood culture instead. Three days later he was home with his Lord. So I would personally recommend everyone to have Dental exam with x-rays before any replacement. I would not want anyone to go through what I have endured. Please understand from my research what happened to my Dad and myself were rarities but as been said “An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure”. May God watch over you and protect you as you have you have your surgery.