Arthrofibrosis: Evaluation, Prevention, and Treatment

Loss of motion of the knee is a challenging dilemma to both the patient and the treating physician. The causes of arthrofibrosis are many but can usually be traced to a traumatic event, intra-articular/ligament knee surgery, knee arthroplasty, and possibly sepsis. Prevention is the best form of treatment, but when this entity does present, early recognition and a supervised physical therapy program are often successful. If conservative treatment fails, operative intervention is warranted. The purpose of this article is to discuss how to appropriately evaluate a patient with loss of knee motion, understand the pathogenesis and classification of arthrofibrosis, review our operative technique and postoperative management of these difficult patients, review the results in the literature concerning arthrofibrosis, and make the reader aware of possible concerns and the future direction of treatment of patients with arthrofibrosis.