MOTOR RECOVERY AFTER ARTHROSCOPIC PARTIAL MENISCECTOMY - ANALYSES OF GAIT AND THE ASCENT AND DESCENT OF STAIRS

We studied motor recovery as shown by locomotor activities after arthroscopic partial medial meniscectomies in seventeen men who were twenty-five to forty-nine years old. The patients were evaluated before the operation and two, four, and eight weeks after the operation. Control values were obtained from twenty-two healthy men whose ages, weights, and heights were similar to those of the patients who had had a meniscectomy. Motion of the hip, knee, and ankle in the sagittal plane and the electromyographic activities (as measured with surface electrodes) in five muscles were recorded while each subject walked on a level walkway and then ascended and descended stairs at free speeds. The results showed that meniscal tears affect the motor-control mechanisms involved in the submaximum locomotor activities that were studied and that these abnormalities may persist for as long as eight weeks after a meniscectomy.