Derotation brace and knee function in patients with anterior cruciate ligament tears

In this article we have tested a ready-made brace to evaluate whether it could improve function in the anterior cruciate ligament injured patient. All patients had their full extent of injury mapped out at arthroscopy. We believe that arthroscopy before treatment for a torn anterior cruciate ligament injury is necessary in order to treat meniscus lesions that could interfere with the rehabilitation. In this study, 26 patients were unstable with a positive pivot-shift, and 16 patients were operated on and thus stable. All patients performed a performance test with and without the brace in a randomized order. Before the start of the investigation, we postulated that patients with a quadriceps atrophy who were unstable would improve their function with the derotation brace. We could not find any effects of the brace in this study. The brace did not significantly improve function in the group of patients who were unstable with a quadriceps atrophy. On the other hand, the brace did not impair function in the patients. We conclude that to be able to improve knee function in the unstable knee, other modes of treatment than bracing are necessary. Bracing should be seen as a complement to these other treatments.