MONDAY, April 9 (HealthDay News) -- About four in 10 orthopaedic implants can be detected by airport metal detectors operating at the normal security level, according to a report published in the April issue of the Journal of Bone and Joint Surgery.
Lars Richardson, M.D., of the Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center in Boston, and colleagues tested 129 patients with 149 orthopaedic implants using a metal detector currently in use by the U.S. Transportation Security Administration, to determine whether the implants would set off the detector at either low- (normal) or high-sensitivity (heightened security) settings.
Thirty-eight percent of the implants were detected on the low-sensitivity setting, compared to 52 percent at high-sensitivity. Seventy-seven percent of arthroplasty implants were detected at low-sensitivity (88 percent at high-sensitivity), compared to 14 percent of plates (32 percent at high-sensitivity). No screws, nails or wires triggered the detector at low-sensitivity, and only 18 percent of screws did at high-sensitivity. Stainless-steel implants were least likely to be detected (24 percent at high-sensitivity), as were implants in the spine and upper extremities (14 and 17 percent at high-sensitivity, respectively).
The authors conclude that "(1) total hip and knee prostheses can be expected to be identified by airport detectors, (2) intramedullary nails and Kirschner wires are unlikely to be detected, (3) lower-extremity implants are much more likely than upper-extremity and spine implants to be detected, and (4) cobalt-chromium and titanium implants are much more likely to be detected than stainless steel."
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