Traumatic Injuries to the Articular Cartilage of the Knee

Abstract

Traumatic injury to the articular cartilage of a joint commonly leads to degenerative arthrosis, thereby attaining clinical significance. Apart from the extent of the injury, the rate of development of the arthrosis is influenced by further factors. Cartilage injuries generally cannot be demonstrated radiologically, so that they are frequently recognized late if at all, and appropriate treatment is not instituted in time. Since articular cartilage has hardly any tendency to heal, the repercussions of isolated cartilage damage are further exacerbated. Those cartilage cells capable of division are situated in the tangential surface layer and are generally damaged by the injury. Even if they are preserved, they have only a limited capacity for proliferation. By formation of rounded complexes of cartilaginous tissues (cloning), they can only slightly reduce the defect from its margins. Even the regenerated tissue does not assume the ordered structure of the intact articular surface, so that the repair is always defective.