The Incidence of the Associated Meniscal Ligament (ML) With the Anterior Cruciate Ligament (ACL) Tears

Objective: To assess the incidence of the associated meniscal ligament (ML) with the anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) tears in hospital A in Medina-KSA. And to see the effect of sports activities in comparison between males and females.

Materials and Methods: In a retrospective study, ninety-nine patients' knee magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) records were selected conveniently from the (A) hospital's picture archiving and communication system (PACS). Patients with suspected anterior cruciate and meniscal ligament' tears were included. Patients with posterior cruciate ligament (PCL) tear, medial collateral ligament (MCL) or lateral collateral ligament (LCL) injury, and previously operated index knees were excluded. All patients were scanned by a 1.5T MRI machine using standard MRI knee scanning protocol. The categorical and continuous variables were presented as percentages, frequencies, and descriptive statistics. The cross-tabulations and chi-square test were applied to obtain the statistical associations between the study variables. A statistical association was considered significant if the P-value was < 0.05.

Results: 72 males and 27 females were included, with a mean age of 33 ± 2.43. 42.4% of the knee tears were ML tears, followed by associated (ACL with ML) tears, noted in 31.3%, and 26.3% were ACL tears. The tears were more frequent in the age group (31-40), reported in 35.3% (out of 99). There was no statistical association between the tears and the participants' age, gender, or sports activities; P value = 0.3, 0.5, and 0.9, respectively.

Conclusion: The study concluded that the isolated ML tears were more frequent than the associated (ACL with ML) tears—moreover, there was no significant statistical association between the participants' age, gender, or sports activities.