Introduction:

Rapid recovery programs in joint replacement surgery are effective in developed countries; The objective of this study was to evaluate the functional outcomes of a rapid recovery program in our population and to compare them with the results of the usual protocol.

Material and methods:

A randomized single blinded clinical trial was conducted with patients who were candidates for total knee arthroplasty (n = 51) recruited from May 2018 to December 2019. group A (n = 24) received a rapid recovery program and group B (n = 27) received the usual protocol, with follow-up for 12 months. For statistical analysis, the Student’s t test (parametric continuous variables), Kruskal-Wallis (nonparametric continuous variables) and the chi-square test (categorical variables) were used.

Results:

Statistically significant differences were found between groups in pain at two months (group A 3.4 ± 1.3 vs group B 4.2 ± 1.4, p = 0.04) and six months (1 ± 0.8 vs 1.7 ± 1.2, p = 0.01), with the WOMAC questionnaire at two months (group A 74.5 ± 7.2 vs group B 67.2 ± 7.5, p ≤ 0.01), six months (88.7 ± 5.3 vs 83.0 ± 4.8, p ≤ 0.01) and 12 months (90.1 ± 4.5 vs 86.7 ± 4.3, p ≤ 0.01), and with the IDKC questionnaire at two months (group A 62.9 ± 7.0 vs group B 55.9 ± 6.1, p ≤ 0.01), six months (74.3 ± 2.7 vs 71.1 ± 3.9, p ≤ 0.01) and 12 months (75.4 ± 3.0 vs 72.6 ± 3.5, p ≤ 0.01).

Conclusions:

The results obtained in this study suggest that the implementation of these programs can be a safe and effective alternative in terms of reducing pain and functional capacity in our population.