Effect of Reconstructive Surgery and Functional Brace Treatments on Kinesthesia in Patients with Acute Anterior Cruciate Ligament Tear

Objective: Anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) tear is one of the most common knee injuries. Kinesthesia is impaired after ACL tear. In this study, using hybrid generalized estimation equations (GEE), which is an efficient method in analyzing correlated data, we try to evaluate the effects of reconstruction surgery and functional brace, along with control of confounding factors, on improving kinesthesia in patients with ACL tear. Materials & Methods: This quasi-experimental study using convenient non-probabilistic sampling, was conducted on 60 patients with acute ACL tear. To evaluate the kinesthesia motion sense, the continuous passive motion machine was used .The test speed was 0.5 degrees per second. The response variable in this study was the kinesthesia motion sense. Surgery , brace, eyes, limbs, BMI, the dominant side, the affected side and age, were considered as the independent variables. R 2.13.0 software was used for fitting the hybrid GEE model. Results: Reconstructive surgery was effective in improving kinesthesia. (OR: 13.94, CI:95%, 7.486-25.997, P<0.001). However, the functional brace did not improve the kinesthesia motion sense (OR: 0.73, CI:95%, 0.52-1.033, P=0.076). The odds of getting a threshold of motion sense in patients with a left dominant side, if the affected side was right, in normal conditions, was 0.019 times the left side. (OR: 0.019, CI:95%, 0.010-0.035, P<0.001). Lack of significant relationship between patients' limbs and kinesthesia motion sense, indicates that affected limbs can also affect the healthy limbs' kinesthesia motion sense (OR: 0.97, CI:95%, 0.806-1.015, P=0.728). Conclusion: Among all other variables included in this study, the variables of reconstruction surgery, affected side, and interaction of the affected side and the dominant side showed a significant relationship.