Document Title: Murrell-AJSM-Jan01

Article Title: The effects of time course after anterior cruciate ligament injury in correlation with meniscal- and articular-cartilage loss

Author: George A.C. Murrell, Sirish Maddali, Lois Horovitz, Stephen P. Oakley, Russell F. Warren.

Publication: The American Journal of Sports Medicine

ISSN: 03635465

Date: January-February 2001.

(Figures included. Reference-denoting numbers appear in the same point size as document text.)

Volume: 29

Issue: 1

Pages: 9-14

Key Words: Knee, cartilage, ligaments, long-term, menisci, articular, chondral, cause-effect analysis, correlation.

 

This article provides an excellent overview of the degeneration of the ligament-injury-history knee. Said deterioration is a known consequence of the damage that the bone-covering articular cartilage often (more than 85% of the time) incurs in conjunction with ACL rupture. Meniscal tearing commonly accompanies full ACL tearing; if it leads to partial or full menisectomy, the consequences for the articular cartilage invariably prove frighteningly severe.

 

ABSTRACT

 

In this study, 130 consecutive patients with anterior cruciate ligament insufficiency who were undergoing ligament reconstruction underwent arthroscopic examination at the time of reconstruction, and any loss of meniscal or chondral integrity was documented in a systematic fashion. In these patients, a greater proportion of the medial meniscus was lost compared with the lateral meniscus (16% versus 5%). On average, 6 square centimetres of the articular cartilage were damaged (5.2 square centimetres) or lost (0.8 square centimetres), with the area of damage and loss greatest on the medial femoral condyle. Patients whose injuries had occurred more than two years before the examination had more than sixfold greater cartilage loss and damage compared with those whose injuries had occurred within the past 2 months. Meniscal loss was associated with a threefold increase in cartilage damage or loss. The group of patients with meniscal loss whose initial anterior cruciate ligament injury occurred more than 2 years before examination exhibited 18 times the amount of cartilage loss or damage as did the group that had no meniscal loss and whose injury occurred less than 1 month before examination.

 

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