Vol. 10, Issue 3 (2024)

Background: Widening of the bone tunnel after ACL reconstruction is an established phenomenon. Computated tomography (CT) is the gold standard over the X-ray and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) during measurement of cross-sectional area of bone tunnels. The dearth of literature on effect of tunnel widening in hamstring attachment sparing method leads to this study. Aim of study to evaluate the short-term outcome of tunnel widening in technique.

Methods: A prospective observational series conducted on 27 patients with ACL tear after ethic Board approval. Patients operated between November 2019 and March 2021 and included. The sample size was calculated using paired t-test. sample size was calculated from effect size 0.50 with 99% power and α 0.05. Friedman test was used to make statistical inference, where data was not normally distributed. The follow-up was done by Lysholm score, tegner activity and knee laxity test, and CT-SCAN at 6-month postoperative.

Results: Mean of pre-injury Lysholm score 49.85 ± 11.44 to post injury 94.41 ± 2.71 at 6-months. Mean of pre-injury tegner activity level 1.56 ± 0.64 improved to 5.33 ± 1.52 at 6-months. The Mean of post injury KLT reading of 7.31 ± 1.87 decreased to a mean of 2.51 ± 0.68 at 6 months. Tunnel widening by the end of 6 months was found to be 12.1% with a range of 4%-23%.

Conclusion: Tunnel widening by the end of 6 months was found to be 12.1% with a range of 4%-23%. We found weak correlation in clinical outcome with tibial tunnel widening.