Abstract:

OBJECTIVE: To summarize material selection for reconstruction among athletes following knee joints’ cruciate ligament sports injury and application prospect of artificial materials.
METHODS: Articles related to artificial knee joints’ cruciate ligament were retrieved from VIP database with key words of “knee joints’ cruciate ligament, sports, ligament repair, ligament reconstruction, artificial material” between January 1998 and October 2009. Inclusion criteria: highly related articles and articles in the same circle published in the authoritative journals or recently published. Exclusion criteria: traditional or duplicated research. All articles were primarily retrieved and the references were also looked up.
RESULTS: Among 72 articles, 21 ones were not related to the required content, 27 ones were duplicated studies, and 24 ones were included based on the inclusion criteria. Autograft and allograft were not ideal materials for repair cruciate ligament among athletes. Otherwise, artificial ligaments had application prospects, for example, LARS artificial ligament has been widely used in Europe. Domestic application of LARS artificial ligament achieved short-term effect on reconstruction of cruciate ligament; however, the long-term effect remains to be further studied, in particular, the cruciate ligament injury of professional athletes. LARS artificial ligament was a safe material.
CONCLUSION: Although artificial ligament still has many shortages and it is not able to completely replace cruciate ligament, artificial ligament provides a selection for reconstruction of anterior and posterior cruciate ligament; therefore, artificial ligament plays an important role in developing reconstruction of cruciate ligament.