Prioritization of patients on scheduled waiting lists: validation of a scoring system for hip and knee arthroplasty

Introduction: The hip and knee replacement priority criteria tool (HKPT) is 1 of 5 tools developed by the Western Canada Waiting List Project for setting priorities among patients awaiting elective procedures. We set out to assess the validity of the HKPT priority criteria score (PCS) and map the maximum acceptable waiting times (MAWTs) for patients to levels of urgency. Methods: Two studies were used to assess convergent and discriminant validity. In study 1, consecutive patients on a waiting list for hip or knee arthroplasty were assessed by orthopedic surgeons from the 4 provinces in Western Canada, using the HKPT and data on patient age, gender, joint site, type of surgery (primary or …