Rotational laxity after anterior cruciate ligament injury by kinematic evaluation of clinical tests

Despite the numerous studies on anterior cruciate ligament biomechanics and clinical tests, some disagreements still exist in the literature on the role of ACL in restraining rotations and which kinematic test after ACL injuries is the most suitable to evaluate this instability. This work analyses the capability of passive clinical and stress tests to detect an ACL state quantifying rotational instability. The study was conducted on animal knees with a new protocol. We found that an internal - external stress test can give a useful indication on the ACL state when used to estimate the side to side differences while varus - valgus laxity and secondary motions in standard kinematic tests did not seem to be affected by ACL injury. The kinematic protocol performed could be used intra-operatively to quantify rotations, allowing a more accurate evaluation of knee instability to guide surgical reconstruction and improve its final outcome.