Background and purpose: Dr. H. Resch has with his arthroscopic extracapsular fixation-technique for recurrent post-traumatic anterior instability using resorbable tacs (Suretac) achieved very good results. We have used his technique since October 1994. The results at 2 year follow-up showed a recurrent instability of 11%. Our purpose was to evaluate the long term results 10 years after we first started using this technique.

Material and methods: From October 1994 until December 1999 107 patients were operated using the Resch-technique. All had a post-traumatic anterior instability with a Bankart-lesion. At follow-up we were able to get in contact with 86 of the patients (80.3%), 62 male and 24 female. Mean age was 30.7 years (18.2–64.8), and the mean follow-up was 8.2 years (4.2–9.4). Sixty-seven of the 86 patients were clinically examined by an independent observer. Nineteen were not available for clinical examination for various reasons; 14 of them filled out a questionnaire and 5 were interviewed by telephone.

Results: Recurrent instability (luxation or subluxation) was found in 13.2% of the patients. Rowe-score showed 90.5% good/excellent, 6.2% fair and 3.1% poor. Mean subjective patient satisfaction was 87 (VAS 0 – 100).

Conclusion: A recurrence rate of 13.2% after 4–9 years follow up is comparable with results from other studies using either open or arthroscopic techniques and is considered satisfactory. The patient satisfaction was high and correlates well with the Rowe-score results. The follow-up of 80.3% is lower than we appreciate, but this is a group of young patients which can be a challenge to track down. We are still in the process of tracing the rest of the patients.