Arthroscopic repair of meniscal tears with inside-out technique

To review the clinical results of arthroscopic meniscal repair and to identify factors that may affect the outcome.

A total of 15 arthroscopic meniscal repairs with inside-out in 14 patients over a 7-year period were evaluated retrospectively. The mean age was 41.2 +/- 11.5 years with a range of 26-64 years. Eleven patients underwent repair for medial meniscal tear, two patients for lateral meniscus and one patient for both in the same knee. All patients were functionally evaluated by Lysholm functional knee scores over an average follow-up of 1 year and 5 months (range: 0.5-7 years).

The mean Lysholm score was 84 out of a maximum of 100. Functional outcome was excellent in 6 patients, good in 5, fair in 2 and poor in one patient. The patient with poor outcome was young with a chronic tear; she had concomitant ipsi-lateral radiculopathy and also had signs of reflex sympathetic dystrophy. One 64 year old patient with fair outcome developed a post-operative flexion contracture of 15 degrees. She also had moderate osteoarthritis of the medial compartment. One patient developed saphenous nerve neuralgia which was relieved spontaneously after a few months.

All patients with excellent results were relatively younger with an acute tear. Elderly patients with concomitant osteoarthritis of the knee joint did not have a satisfactory outcome even if the tear was acute.