BMJ  2006;332:1153 (13 May), doi:10.1136/bmj.332.7550.1153

Letter

Hamstring v patellar tendon autografts

A patient's and clinician's perspective

The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below.

EDITOR—As a patient who has had a bone-patellar tendon-bone autograft for anterior cruciate ligament reconstruction, I agree with Biau et al's findings that anterior knee pain can be troublesome at times.1 Biau et al also emphasise the importance of discussing such potential problems preoperatively with patients, especially those from Asia. Being Indian in origin, I have had to sit cross-legged or to kneel for periods at religious or social events, and this has led to serious discomfort afterwards.

As a clinician and researcher, I note the sound methods of this meta-analysis but that the quality of the studies was generally poor. The authors do not discuss publication bias. There was also no mention of cost in the article (both financial and quality of life).

Such comparative data are probably hard to come by, but the time and effort (of patients, practitioners, and physiotherapists, etc) necessary to achieve a . . . [Full text of this article]

Sanjay Purkayastha, clinical research fellow

Department of Biosurgery and Surgical Technology, Imperial College, London W2 1NY s.purkayastha@imperial.ac.uk


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Relevant Article

Bone-patellar tendon-bone autografts versus hamstring autografts for reconstruction of anterior cruciate ligament: meta-analysis
David J Biau, Caroline Tournoux, Sandrine Katsahian, Peter J Schranz, and Rémy S Nizard
BMJ 2006 332: 995-1001. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]

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