MRI findings of anterior cruciate ligament graft tear

Abstract

Objective To summarize MRI features of anterior cruciate ligament graft tear and to explore the differences of MRI findings between acute tear and chronic tear, and compare the diagnostic ability of MRI and clinical examinations for graft tear. Methods MR images of 43 patients (44 knees) with anterior cruciate ligament graft tear (40 complete tear, 4 partial tear) confirmed by secondary arthroscopy were retrospectively analyzed. There were 18 acute tear and 26 chronic tear. Primary and secondary signs reported with conventional anterior cruciate ligament tear were adopted to evaluate graft tear. The exact probability method was used to compare the prevalence difference between various direct and indirect signs and the χ2 test was used to compare the accuracy between MRI and physical examination. Results The primary signs in MR images of anterior cruciate ligament graft tear included graft discontinuity in 13 kness, graft thickening with edematous high signal intensity in 12 knees, decreased slope of graft fibers in 6 kness, graft disappearing in 5 knees, and distinct graft atrophy in 3 knees. The secondary signs included kissing bone contusion in 4 knees, posteriorcruciate ligament buckling in 3 knees, increased anterior tibial displacement in 2 knees, bone contusion of the lateral condyle of femur, and bone contusion of thetibia condyle in 1 knee, respectively. There were no significant differences regarding the proportion of each sign between acute and chronic graft tear. Accuracy of MRI, Lachman test, and anterior drawer test were 87.5% (35/40), 95.0% (38/40) and 95.0% (38/40), respectively, which were all significantly higher than that of pivot shift test(42.5%, 17/40) with significant differences (χ2=17.80, P<0.0083). Conclusions MRI is sensitive for diagnosing anterior cruciate ligament graft tear, the primary signs is the main evidence for the diagnosis of ACL graft tear, but it is hard to distinguish acute and chronic graft tear based on MR findings. The diagnostic accuracy has no statistically significant differences among MRI, Lachman test, and anterior drawer test, but they are all higher than pivot shift test. Key words: Anterior cruciate ligament; Magnetic resonance imaging; Prosthesis implantation