Summary

Repair tension during arthroscopic rotator cuff repair was significantly affected by mediolateral tear length and fatty infiltration of supraspinatus on preoperative MRI.

Abstract

Purpose

Intraoperative repair tension during arthroscopic rotator cuff repair (ARCR) is considered as the major predictive factor for postoperative rotator cuff integrity.
However, very few studies have correlated intraoperative repear tension with preoperative factors. Purpose of this study was to identify preoperative predictive factors of repair tension.

Methods

This prospective study involved 120 consecutive patients who underwent ARCR from 2014 through 2016. Inclusion criteria were patients with medium or larger sized tear and a minimum of 12 moths follow-up. Patients who had unrepairable tear or partial repair were excluded. Intraoperative repair tension was measured according to the method of Davidson using a tensiometer. Correlation between repair tension and preoperative factors (age, sex, tear size, fatty infiltration, muscle atrophy) were evaluated with Pearson and Spearman correlation coefficient tests. Multiple regression analysis was performed to identify independent predictors of repair tension.

Results

Mean repair tension was 26.6N. Repair tension was significantly correlated with the tear size in mediolateral (p<0.001) and anteroposterior (p<0.001) direction, fatty infiltration of supraspinatus (p=0.001) and infraspinatus (p=0.001). Age, sex and occupation ratio of supraspinatus were not significantly correlated with repair tension. Multiple regression analysis demonstrated that tear size in mediolateral direction (p<0.001) and fatty infiltration of supraspinatus (p=0.016) were the independent predictors of repair tension.

Conclusion

This study showed that intraoperative repair tension was significantly affected by mediolateral tear length and fatty infiltration of supraspinatus.