The value of magnetic resonance arthrography in the evaluation of repaired menisci

To evaluate the diagnostic value of direct magnetic resonance (MR) arthrography in detection of re-torn or unhealed menisci which were previously repaired.

Twenty-six menisci of 24 symptomatic patients who had undergone a meniscus repair surgery were included in this retrospective study. These patients had been evaluated with gadolinium-enhanced direct MR arthrography. A subsequent second-look arthroscopy was performed thereafter. The findings of MR arthrography were compared with the arthroscopic findings.

Sixteen recurrent meniscal lesions were detected with MR arthrography; the remaining ten repaired menisci were evaluated as healed. At second-look arthroscopy, six out of 26 repaired menisci were evaluated as completely healed. Eight of them had incomplete healing, and 12 of them were unhealed. MR arthrography had four false-negative results, but there were none false-positive results. It was arthroscopically shown that three of these four false-negative results were belonged to patients who had incomplete healing. MR arthrography had a sensitivity, specificity, and overall accuracy of 80, 100, and 84.6 %, respectively. When incomplete lesions were left out of analysis, its sensitivity and accuracy reached to 94.8 and 94.4 %.

The findings of this study showed that MR arthrography was a reliable diagnostic tool in evaluating previously repaired menisci. Yet diagnosis of incomplete meniscal lesions seemed to be challenging.