Micro or Nano Does not affect the Functional Outcomes in the Midterm Follow-up

OpenAlex İngilizce

Introduction: Bone marrow stimulation techniques are the most commonly preferred options in the treatment of articular cartilage damage due to many features.Although nanofracture method that was developed in order to improve this technique has proven efficacy in animal models and in vitro studies, functional outcomes of nanofracture have not been shown in actual patients.In this study, our purpose was to compare the clinical outcomes of nanofracture technique and traditional microfracture technique in the knee joint.Material and Methods: Patients operated using the microfracture technique as group 1 (n=22) and patients operated using the Nanofx (Arthrosurface Inc., Franklin, Massachusetts) technique as group 2 (n=20) were prospectively evaluated.Demographic characteristics of the patients, defect size and localization were recorded.Patients with isolated cartilage damage who had ICRS Grade 3-4 cartilage lesion and no concomitant pathologies were included in the study.Each surgical procedure was performed by the same surgeon by following the same surgical protocol.Clinical outcomes in the patients were assessed using Modified Cincinnati and Tegner-Lysholm scoring systems at months 6, 12, 24, 36 and 48.Results: Calculated mean follow-up periods were 50.8±3.1 and 51.2±3.2 in groups 1 and 2, respectively.There was no statistically significant difference between the groups in terms of the defect and demographic characteristics of the patients.In the follow-up of patients using functional scoring, there was no statistically significant difference in Lysholm (p=0.294) and Cincinnati (p=0.234)scores between the two groups.Conclusion: There was no difference in the mid-term between the functional outcomes of microfracture and nanofracture techniques in the treatment of cartilage lesions.