Surface roughness, porosity and wettability of gentamicin-loaded bone cements and their antibiotic release

In this study, the release of gentamicin as a function of time was measured for six different gentamicin-loaded bone cements and related with the surface roughness, porosity and wettability of the cements. Initial release rates varied little between the six bone cements (CMW1, CMW3, CMW Endurance, CMW 2000, Palacos, and Palamed) and ranged from 8.6 to 14.1 μg/cm2/h. The total amounts of gentamicin released after 1 week varied between 4.0 and 5.3% of the total amount of antibiotic incorporated for the CMW cements and was 8.4% for Palacos. Palamed released after 1 week significantly more of the gentamicin incorporated (17.0%). The wettability of all cements was similar (water contact angles between 70 and 80°), but the surface roughness and the porosity of the cements varied markedly. Initial release rates increased with surface roughness, although the correlation coefficient was low (0.64), while total amounts released increased linearly (correlation coefficient 0.97) with the bulk porosity of the cements. Consequently, it can be concluded that the release kinetics of gentamicin from bone cements is controlled by a combination of surface roughness and porosity.