Serial structural and functional assessments of rotator cuff repairs: do they differ at 6 and 19 months postoperatively?

Prospective evaluation of clinical and radiologic factors predicting return to activity within 6 months after arthroscopic rotator cuff repair

“…At 6 months postoperatively, some tendon maturation may still be taking place and strength may not be fully recovered. 27 Mechanical pullout tests of repairs at 6 months, for instance, have shown a failure strength that represents only 81% of an intact tendon. 20 Moreover, only 25 of the 100 points in the Constant score are allocated to strength, 9 and lack of strength is the main subjective complaint at midterm follow-up after rotator cuff repair.…”

“…Additional time thus should be encouraged in many patients who have an unsatisfactory result at 6 months. 27 On the other hand, for those patients who had pain and lacked healing at 6 months, pain persisted. Similar to the findings of Namdari et al, 37 only about half of these patients in our study obtained a satisfactory result.…”

“…Such a time period is sufficient to perform structural and functional assessments of rotator cuff repairs. 27 Workers' compensation patients, patients involved in motor vehicle accidents, and patients involved in litigation were also included. Exclusion criteria included glenohumeral arthritis, an acromiohumeral distance of less than 7 mm, fatty infiltration of grade 3 or higher according to Goutallier et al, 21,42 previous shoulder surgery, irreparable tears or partial repairs, partial-thickness tears, and combined labral repairs.…”

Revision Versus Primary Arthroscopic Rotator Cuff Repair

“…These findings support previous studies that showed rotator cuffs either regain their integrity or retear within 6 months after repair. 20 Given a similar operative technique and uniform rehabilitation protocol, the higher retear rates of the revision group could be explained by the fact that the repairs were done in a degenerated and already weakened tendon from previous repair. Biberthaler et al 2 showed that in the regions of degenerated rotator cuff, there was a significantly lower microcirculation-less capillary density and diameter compared with the unaffected rotator cuff regions in patients undergoing arthroscopic rotator cuff repairs.…”

Intratendinous Rotator Cuff Tears

“…All patients underwent a follow-up MRI evaluation at a postoperative 6 months to determine rotator cuff integrity and healing status of the repaired tendon. 22 We classified rotator cuff repair status as per the Sugaya classification. 42 …”