Trial reportKnee surgery, sports traumatology, arthroscopy : official journal of the ESSKA2021
Effects of unloader bracing on clinical outcomes and articular cartilage regeneration following microfracture of isolated chondral defects: a randomized trial.
Trial report in Knee surgery, sports traumatology, arthroscopy : official journal of the ESSKA, 2021. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 2 papers.
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The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
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Who cites it
2 citing papers in PubMed, 9 citations in OpenAlex.
- Conservative treatments of bone marrow lesions.Journal of experimental orthopaedics · 2025Article
- Regeneration of full-thickness cartilage defects using small umbilical cord-derived fast proliferating cells combined with magnesium in a rat model.Cell transplantationArticle
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
4 authors at 3 institutions in 3 countries.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
purposeTo determine whether the use of an unloading brace can increase the thickness of cartilage regenerate after microfracture surgery.
methodsThis is a randomized (1:1) controlled clinical trial. Twenty-four patients who underwent microfracture between 2012 and 2015 were identified and were randomly assigned to an unloading brace group or a no-brace group. All patients were kept non-weight bearing for the first eight weeks after surgery and then patients in the intervention group began using an unloading brace for an average of 63.9 (SD = 41.6) days to protect clot stability by exerting a varus or valgus force on the knee to decrease the force on the knee's lateral or medial compartment, respectively. Quality of the cartilage repair was assessed with knee magnetic resonance imaging to determine repair tissue thickness (primary outcome), repair tissue volume, and T2 relaxation times at 12 and 24 months after surgery. Clinical outcomes were evaluated with KOOS, Tegner, SF12, and Lysholm questionnaires at six, 12 and 24 months after surgery.
resultsThree patients were lost to follow-up, resulting in 21 patients ultimately analyzed. The unloading brace repair tissue was greater than the no-brace group in volume (26.8 ± 23.7 mm
conclusionThis study found a significant mid-term increase in cartilage repair tissue thickness following unloading bracing in patients recovering from microfracture for isolated chondral defects. LEVEL OF EVIDENCE: II.
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