Incidence of positive intraoperative allograft cultures used in knee ligament reconstruction

Soft-tissue allografts are valuable options in knee ligament reconstructive surgery. The purpose of this study was to determine the risk of soft-tissue contamination before implantation and the occurrence of infection after implantation in patients who received soft-tissue allografts for knee reconstructive procedures. A retrospective review of medical records was performed for patients who had undergone knee ligament surgery with allograft tissues at one institution between 1993 and 2004. Cultures were positive in 6 (5.7%) of 105 cases. Coagulase-negative Staphylococcus was the most common organism. None of these patients developed postoperative infections. The culture-positive group had a longer period of joint effusion postoperatively, compared with the culture-negative group (14.2 weeks versus 9.6 weeks). Patients with positive cultures required no additional treatment other than close observation.