An ultrasonic stress wave approach on quantitative osseointegration assessment of a novel implant

Quantitative and reliable monitoring of osseointegration will help determine the integrity of the orthopaedic construct, promote novel implant design, facilitate early mobilisation and provide the potential of through-life integrity assessment. The principle of ultrasonic wave propagation has been applied to structural health monitoring in engineering structures for the detection of the onset of damage and its progression. The utilisation of this knowledge is crucial for the through-life integrity assessment of engineering structures. This paper seek to present an ultrasonic wave approach, commonly used in engineering structures, to assess the osseointegration of this novel implant onto a long bone. A series of experiments were conducted using aluminium femur-like and representative implant surrogates. The findings discuss the potential use of stress wave propagation to assess the unification of these surrogates. The study shows an Osseointegration Index using ultrasonic methods can measure the integration of a bone and implant. This also highlights a potential quantitative evaluation technique which is independent of the bone-implant geometry and not affected by the presence of soft tissue.