There is an approximately 1.6-fold greater rate of ACL tears per athletic exposure in HS female athletes than males. However, there is significant risk in both sexes, particularly in high-risk sports such as soccer, football, basketball, and lacrosse. Knowledge of sport-specific risk is essential for future injury reduction programs, parent-athlete decision making, and accurate physician counseling.
We systematically identified, and subsequently outlined and compared, the current trends of the various components of pediatric-specific ACL rehabilitation protocols, categorized by orthopaedic intervention. Several protocols are based on time frames rather than milestones achieved, with newer protocols involving milestone-based progression. Newer protocols are also incorporating formal prevention programs. Just as skeletally immature patients require unique methods of operative fixation, so too do they require catered rehabilitation protocols. To effectively prevent re-rupture or contralateral injury, future research should focus on prospectively evaluating each component of the rehabilitation protocols described and return-to-sport criteria for young patients.
OCD surgical treatment patterns can be used in future studies to determine which techniques are most effective for given indications, with the goal of designing a research-proven optimal treatment regimen for skeletally immature patients.
If genetic predispositions for OCD are detected early enough in life, attempts at activity modification, counseling, and orthopaedic monitoring may successfully reduce progression of this condition, which may lead to progressive osteoarthritis in the third to fourth decade in at-risk patients.
Purpose
The purposes of this study were to evaluate the notch width index (NWI) as a risk factor for anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) rupture in the pediatric and adolescent patient population via multicenter analysis and to detect any differences in the NWI among cohorts having sustained either a unilateral or bilateral ACL rupture.
Methods
A consecutive series of patients ≤19 years old was enrolled from January 1999 through July 2010 at 2 academic pediatric orthopaedic tertiary-care hospitals. Demographic and anatomic morphology data were collected for 3 cohorts: unilateral ACL ruptures, bilateral ACL ruptures, and a control group. A single blinded reviewer determined notch width measurements via T2 coronal magnetic resonance imaging sequences in a standardized manner, using a previously described technique.
Results
Of the 68 patients included for analysis, 22 sustained unilateral ACL rupture, 23 sustained bilateral ruptures, and 23 comprised the control group. There was a statistically significant difference appreciated in direct comparison of the NWI in the bilateral rupture group and the control group, as well as between the unilateral rupture group and the control group. There was no statistically significant difference between the NWI in the unilateral versus the bilateral rupture group.
Conclusion
Given the known inconsistencies in the existing literature, our findings provide further support of a narrow NWI as a significant contributing factor to both unilateral and bilateral ACL injury risk in the pediatric and adolescent patient population.
Level of Evidence
III, retrospective cohort study.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.