Anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) tears are common in athletes and are often related to a non-contact pivoting injury mechanism in a deceleration maneuver.
The symptoms have been described as a “pop” sensation and the development of an acute or subacute effusion. The clinical instability that often accompanies this injury limits sport activity especially contact-sports.
Partial tears that predominantly affect one of the two major ACL bundles can also provoke conditions of pain and instability that pose a great challenge with respect to treatment, as treatment involves the preservation of the bundle that is found to be intact and its reinforcement with the objective of overcoming the symptoms that brought the patient to the operating room to begin with and return them to their sporting activity.
The use of plasma rich in growth factors has proven useful in improving ligament maturation and specifically anterior cruciate ligament in vitro, in animals and in humans.
ACL injury can be associated with muscle weakness, biomechanical limitation, loss of proprioception, donor site morbidity with the use of autograft tissue, graft failure, and early posttraumatic osteoarthritis. Advancements in tissue engineering and regenerative medicine have resulted in a new interest in the biologic treatment of partial tears of the ACL.
The use of novel biologic ACL repair techniques,including growth factors, PRP, stem cells, and bioscaffolds,have been reported to result in promising preclinical and short-term clinical outcomes.