Evaluation and comparison of clinical results of femoral fixation devices in arthroscopic anterior cruciate ligament reconstruction

• Different femoral fixation devices give similar clinical results.
• The results of hamstring autograft fixation with suspensory devices were satisfactory.
• The recovery time after reconstruction was similar for different suspensory devices.
• The failure rate was very low in reconstruction with suspensory devices.

BackgroundSeveral femoral fixation devices are available for hamstring tendon autograft in anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) reconstruction, but the best technique is debatable.PurposeWe hypothesised that different suspensory femoral fixation techniques have no superiority over each other. The aim of this study was to evaluate and compare the clinical results of different suspensory femoral fixation devices in arthroscopic ACL reconstruction.Study designThis was a Level III, retrospective, comparative study.MethodsA total of 100 consecutive patients who underwent arthroscopic ACL reconstruction in a single institution with a mean follow-up time of 40 months (12–67 months) were divided into three groups according to femoral fixation devices as ‘Endobutton’ (n = 34), ‘Transfix’ (n = 35) and ‘Aperfix’ (n = 31). The length of painful period after surgery, time to return to work and sporting activities, final range of motion, anterior drawer and Lachman tests, knee instability symptoms, International Knee Documentation Committee (IKDC) subjective knee evaluation score, Short Form 36 (SF-36) score, Lysholm knee score and Tegner point of the patients were evaluated and compared between groups.ResultsThere were no significant differences between the groups. All techniques led to significant recovery in knee instability tests and symptoms.ConclusionIn this study, the clinical results of different suspensory femoral fixation techniques were found to be similar. We believe that different femoral fixation techniques have no effect on clinical results provided that the technique is correctly applied. The surgeon must choose a technique appropriate to his or her experience.