Surgery for 37-year-old w/ACL tear?

[DANXP]

newbie here...

wanted to get advice about my knee with a ACL tear that i've had for 20 years...

i'm thinking of getting reconstructive surgery on my knee due to an ACL tear that's 20 years old... i had it scoped about 8 years ago to remove floating meniscus, but opted not to reconstruct...

i used to be very active (volleyball, basketball, snowboarding) even with this condition (with my cti2 knee brace on) up until 1 year ago, when my knee really started acting up... it would lock up occasionally, feel unstable, have sharp pain, etc...

have i done too much damage to it in the years i've played sports on it?

am i going to eventually get arthritis in this knee?

i'd like to continue to be active, but the problem is i may need reconstruction to do so...

thanks for any advice...

[SPK]

I'm no Doctor, but I think that if it's causing you problems now, then it's probably best to get it sorted out. Especially if you want to continue participating in sports in the future.

I don't know how the ACL will affect your getting Arthritis or not, but the damage to your Meniscus means you probably have a high chance of developing Arthritis in the future.

At the very least, it's probably a good idea to get the knee checked out by a professional and get his opinion.

[South Sydney Sports Med]

With respect to reconstruction, maybe the horse has bolted. There is a good chance that your knee pain at the moment is due to worn articular cartilage (i.e. early arthritis) rather than instability.

An ACL reconstruction can't do anything about knee pain due to existing cartilage damage. It is an operation that allows you to change direction in multidirectional sports without the knee giving way.

I would suggest that your days of football, basketball, volleyball etc. are all over given the state of your knee.

However, the flowchart is pretty simple:

(1) Get a knee X-ray
(2) If you have early arthritis, cut out the heavy loading sports and also avoid surgery.
(3) If you have a normal knee X-ray you have dodged a bullet and perhaps you could have an ACL reconstruction if you wanted to keep playing sports.

Unfortunately the likely money is on (2) rather than (3).