Abstract
Introduction: Meniscal extrusion is defined as the situation in which the meniscus is partially or totally luxated from the tibial plateau. The aim of this work is to ascertain the prevalence of meniscal extrusion in non arthritic patients and to define those factors related to it. Special attention was given to the fact of anatomic variations in the menisci attachments.
Methods: The knee MRI of 100 patients that were operated on arthroscopically in our institution was prospectively studied. Seventy-two males and 28 females, average age of 36.6 years (range between 13 and 64), entered in the study. There were 43 right-knees and 57 left-knees. The average weight of the patients was 77 kg (range 44 to 135).
Results: With respect to the medial meniscus 68.9% of the cases showed some degree of extrusion, averaging at 28% of the meniscal size (ranging from 10% to 60%). In the case of the lateral meniscus extrusion averaging 15% (ranging from 10% to 40%) was seen in 18.8% of the cases.
In this series the posterior types of anterior medial meniscus insertion were the most frequently found (69.5%).
Medial meniscal extrusion was significatively correlated to the presence of a chondral lesion (p = 0.008) and to anterior medial meniscus insertion (p = 0.001). No statistical significant relationship to the rest of parameters studied was encountered. None of the parameters studied were related to lateral meniscus extrusion
Discusion: Meniscal extrusion is frequent in our series and, the hypothesis that those patients who have an anterior variant of the anterior horn insertion of the medial meniscus tend to show greater extrusion is confirmed.
Theses abstracts were prepared by Professor Roger Lemaire. Correspondence should be addressed to EFORT Central Office, Freihofstrasse 22, CH-8700 Küsnacht, Switzerland.
