What Is the Failure Rate After Arthroscopic Repair of Bucket-Handle Meniscal Tears? A Systematic Review and Meta-analysis.

BACKGROUND: Meniscal repair has become the treatment of choice for meniscal tears, especially in the subset of bucket-handle meniscal tears (BHMTs). However, a comprehensive estimate of the corresponding failure rate is not available, thus maintaining doubts about the healing potential of these tears. Furthermore, a wide range of factors to predict high failure rates have been reported but with conflicting evidence. PURPOSE: To determine the failure rate after arthroscopic repair of BHMTs as reported in the literature, compare this with the failure rate of simple meniscal tears extracted from the same studies, and analyze the influence of factors previously reported to be predictive of meniscal repair failure. STUDY DESIGN: Systematic review and meta-analysis; Level of evidence, 4. METHODS: A systematic search was conducted by 2 independent reviewers using principal bibliographic databases (PubMed, Scopus, Cochrane Library, and EMBASE). After a stepwise exclusion process, 38 articles met the inclusion criteria. Failure rate data were analyzed with a random-effects proportional meta-analysis (weighted for individual study size), and forest plots were constructed to determine any statistically significant differences between BHMTs versus simple tears (longitudinal, radial, or horizontal), medial versus lateral BHMTs, isolated procedures versus repairs with concomitant anterior cruciate ligament reconstruction, and tears in red-red versus red-white zones. Moreover, a meta-regression analysis was conducted to evaluate the effect of patient age and sex, suture technique (in-out or all-inside), time from injury to surgery, mean number of stitches, and length of follow-up on failure rates. RESULTS: The pooled failure rate was 14.8% (95% CI, 11.3%-18.3%; I2 = 77.2%). A total of 17 studies provided failure rates of both BHMT repairs (46/311 repairs) and simple tear repairs (54/546 repairs), demonstrating a significantly higher failure rate for BHMT repairs (risk ratio [RR] = 1.50; 95% CI, 1.05-2.15; I2 = 0%; P = .03). Medial BHMT repairs (RR = 1.94; 95% CI, 1.25-3.01; I2 = 0%; P = .003) and isolated repairs (RR = 1.77; 95% CI, 1.15-2.72; I2 = 0%; P = .009) had statistically higher risk of failure, but no statistically significant difference was found between tears in red-red versus red-white zones. Among the other factors evaluated with meta-regression, only the mean number of stitches showed a statistically significant effect on failure rates. CONCLUSION: Based on the currently available literature, this systematic review provides a reasonably comprehensive analysis of failure rate after arthroscopic BHMT repair; failure is estimated to occur in 14.8% of cases. Medial tears and isolated repairs were the 2 major predictors of failure.

The impact of COVID-19 prevention measures on epidemiology of orthopedic injuries: the outbreak ages fractures!

BACKGROUND: The application of stringent prevention measures for contrasting COVID-19 spread generated changes not only in the outbreak course, but also in epidemiology of traumatic fractures. The aim of this study was to report the epidemiologic characteristics of surgically-treated fractures during the COVID-19 outbreak over a six-month period, and to describe the variation in volumes and types of injuries, by comparing them with fractures which occurred during the same period in 2019. METHODS: We retrospectively analyzed all surgically-treated fractures which were admitted from the January 1st 2020 to June 30th 2020, and compared these data to those of the corresponding timeframe in 2019. The collected data of interest included demographics, such as age and gender, fracture location, time lapse between presentation at Emergency Department and admission in the ward, length of stay. RESULTS: A total of 117 patients were admitted with a diagnosis of facture and surgically treated, with no cases of COVID-19 positive patients. In the corresponding period of 2019, the number of patients admitted for the same reasons was 129. This decrease was more significant in the period between March and April (-30.6%), during which time prevention measures were more stringent. The only statistically significant discrepancy between the two study groups was the mean age, which was significantly higher in 2020. The location of examined injuries were similar in the two study groups, with proximal femur fractures representing the most frequent injuries. CONCLUSIONS: This study demonstrated significant changes of epidemiologic patterns of fractures during COVID-19 outbreak. These data should provide support for clinicians and government to evaluate the management and prevention strategies of traumatic not only during outbreak but also in non-outbreak period.