A 58-year-old woman suffering from chronic knee pain has been successfully treated with a novel procedure at a city hospital in Chennai. Surgeons transplanted a healthy meniscus from another patient into her damaged knee, offering an alternative to total knee replacement.
Procedure Details
The patient's meniscus, a C-shaped pad of tissue that cushions and stabilises the knee joint, was severely damaged and could not be repaired through stitching or reshaping. Dr N Ragunanthan, the orthopaedic surgeon who led the team at Rathimed Speciality Hospital, explained that without this pad, the thigh bone and shin bone press directly against each other, causing pain and reduced mobility.
Meniscus Allograft Transplantation
The surgical team performed a meniscus allograft transplantation, a procedure where a healthy meniscus from a donor is fixed into the damaged knee. The donor was a patient undergoing total knee replacement at the same hospital. In such surgeries, the meniscus is normally removed and discarded. However, the surgeons harvested the tissue in the operating room, carefully shaped it to fit the recipient's knee, and secured it with fixation devices.
This approach allowed the woman to retain her natural knee joint and avoid the more invasive total knee replacement surgery. The hospital reported that the patient is recovering well and experiencing significant relief from her chronic pain.
