Flexion contracture persists if the contracture is more than 15° at 3 months after total knee arthroplasty.

After total knee arthroplasty, it is common for flexion contracture to exist during the early stages of postoperative course. We retrospectively investigated whether the early postoperative contracture would finally disappear, in 104 osteoarthritic knees after surgery with posterior-stabilized prostheses. The knees were divided into 5 groups based on their contracture 3 months after surgery (group I: no contracture, group II: 5°, group III: 10°, group IV: 15°, group V: ≥20°). The proportion of patients with residual contracture (≥5°) 2 years after surgery was 1/34 in group I, 4/30 in group II, 6/23 in group III, 6/6 in group IV, and 11/11 in group V. The results show that flexion contracture eventually existed if the contracture was more than 15° 3 months after surgery.