This systematic review was designed to evaluate the reporting of non-hip score outcomes following surgical management of femoroacetabular impingement (FAI). MEDLINE, EMBASE and PubMed were searched and screened in duplicate for studies involving non-hip score outcomes following the surgical management of FAI. A full-text review of eligible studies was conducted and references were searched using pre-determined inclusion and exclusion criteria. Thirty-three studies involving 3198 patients were included in this review. The most common non-hip score outcomes reported included: patient satisfaction (72.7%), symptom improvement (24.7%), pain improvement (12.4%), hip range of motion (12.3%) and return to sport (6.8%). The most frequently reported standardized hip outcome scores used were the modified Harris Hip Score (mHHS) (41.2%), Non-Arthritic Hip Score (NAHS) (29.4%), Hip Outcome Score-Activities of Daily Living (HOS-ADL) (26.5%), the Western Ontario McMaster Universities Index of Osteoarthritis (WOMAC) (17.6%), the HOS Sport-Specific Subscale (SSS) (17.6%). The most commonly reported non-hip score outcomes are patient satisfaction, symptom improvement and pain improvement. Patients report high levels of satisfaction when surveyed post-operatively. A discrepancy exists between what outcomes the literature suggests should be reported and what outcomes are actually reported. Return to sport is often held as a major patient-important outcome yet it is seldom reported in studies assessing the efficacy of FAI surgery. Second, despite emerging evidence that outcome measures such as the HOS or IHOT evaluate the FAI patient population precisely, other standardized hip score outcomes (mHHS and NAHS) are still more commonly reported.
Keywords: II; III and IV studies; Level IV; systematic review of Level I.