Cargando…

The fabella syndrome - a rare cause of posterolateral knee pain: a review of the literature and two case reports

BACKGROUND: The purpose of this article was to evaluate the risks and benefits of non-operative treatment versus surgical excision of a fabella causing posterolateral knee pain. We performed a systematic review of literature and also present two case reports. Twelve publications were found in a PubM...

Descripción completa

Detalles Bibliográficos
Autores principales: Driessen, Arne, Balke, Maurice, Offerhaus, Christoph, White, William James, Shafizadeh, Sven, Becher, Christoph, Bouillon, Bertil, Höher, Jürgen
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: BioMed Central 2014
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3987160/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24666711
http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/1471-2474-15-100
_version_ 1782479631002107904
author Driessen, Arne
Balke, Maurice
Offerhaus, Christoph
White, William James
Shafizadeh, Sven
Becher, Christoph
Bouillon, Bertil
Höher, Jürgen
author_facet Driessen, Arne
Balke, Maurice
Offerhaus, Christoph
White, William James
Shafizadeh, Sven
Becher, Christoph
Bouillon, Bertil
Höher, Jürgen
author_sort Driessen, Arne
collection PubMed
description BACKGROUND: The purpose of this article was to evaluate the risks and benefits of non-operative treatment versus surgical excision of a fabella causing posterolateral knee pain. We performed a systematic review of literature and also present two case reports. Twelve publications were found in a PubMed literature review searching the word “fabella syndrome”. Non-operative treatment and surgical excision of the fabella has been described. CASE PRESENTATION: Two patients presented to our outpatient clinic with persisting posterolateral knee pain. In both cases the presence of a fabella was identified, located in close proximity to the posterolateral femoral condyle. All other common causes of intra- and extra articular pathologies possibly causing the posterolateral knee pain were excluded. Following failure to respond to physiotherapy both patients underwent arthroscopy which excluded other possible causes for posterolateral knee pain. The decision was made to undertake surgical excision of the fabella in both cases without complication. Both patients were examined 6 month and one year after surgery with the Tegner activity score, the Visual Analogue Scale (VAS), and International Knee Documentation Committee Score (IKDC). CONCLUSION: Consistent posterolateral pain during exercise might indicate the presence of a fabella syndrome. Resecting the fabella can be indicated and is a minor surgical procedure with minimal risk. Despite good results in the literature posterolateral knee pain can persist and prevent return to a high level of sports. Level of evidence: IV, case reports and analysis of literature.
format Online
Article
Text
id pubmed-3987160
institution National Center for Biotechnology Information
language English
publishDate 2014
publisher BioMed Central
record_format MEDLINE/PubMed
spelling pubmed-39871602014-04-16 The fabella syndrome - a rare cause of posterolateral knee pain: a review of the literature and two case reports Driessen, Arne Balke, Maurice Offerhaus, Christoph White, William James Shafizadeh, Sven Becher, Christoph Bouillon, Bertil Höher, Jürgen BMC Musculoskelet Disord Case Report BACKGROUND: The purpose of this article was to evaluate the risks and benefits of non-operative treatment versus surgical excision of a fabella causing posterolateral knee pain. We performed a systematic review of literature and also present two case reports. Twelve publications were found in a PubMed literature review searching the word “fabella syndrome”. Non-operative treatment and surgical excision of the fabella has been described. CASE PRESENTATION: Two patients presented to our outpatient clinic with persisting posterolateral knee pain. In both cases the presence of a fabella was identified, located in close proximity to the posterolateral femoral condyle. All other common causes of intra- and extra articular pathologies possibly causing the posterolateral knee pain were excluded. Following failure to respond to physiotherapy both patients underwent arthroscopy which excluded other possible causes for posterolateral knee pain. The decision was made to undertake surgical excision of the fabella in both cases without complication. Both patients were examined 6 month and one year after surgery with the Tegner activity score, the Visual Analogue Scale (VAS), and International Knee Documentation Committee Score (IKDC). CONCLUSION: Consistent posterolateral pain during exercise might indicate the presence of a fabella syndrome. Resecting the fabella can be indicated and is a minor surgical procedure with minimal risk. Despite good results in the literature posterolateral knee pain can persist and prevent return to a high level of sports. Level of evidence: IV, case reports and analysis of literature. BioMed Central 2014-03-26 /pmc/articles/PMC3987160/ /pubmed/24666711 http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/1471-2474-15-100 Text en Copyright © 2014 Driessen et al.; licensee BioMed Central Ltd. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0 This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly credited. The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver (http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated.
spellingShingle Case Report
Driessen, Arne
Balke, Maurice
Offerhaus, Christoph
White, William James
Shafizadeh, Sven
Becher, Christoph
Bouillon, Bertil
Höher, Jürgen
The fabella syndrome - a rare cause of posterolateral knee pain: a review of the literature and two case reports
title The fabella syndrome - a rare cause of posterolateral knee pain: a review of the literature and two case reports
title_full The fabella syndrome - a rare cause of posterolateral knee pain: a review of the literature and two case reports
title_fullStr The fabella syndrome - a rare cause of posterolateral knee pain: a review of the literature and two case reports
title_full_unstemmed The fabella syndrome - a rare cause of posterolateral knee pain: a review of the literature and two case reports
title_short The fabella syndrome - a rare cause of posterolateral knee pain: a review of the literature and two case reports
title_sort fabella syndrome - a rare cause of posterolateral knee pain: a review of the literature and two case reports
topic Case Report
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3987160/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/24666711
http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/1471-2474-15-100
work_keys_str_mv AT driessenarne thefabellasyndromeararecauseofposterolateralkneepainareviewoftheliteratureandtwocasereports
AT balkemaurice thefabellasyndromeararecauseofposterolateralkneepainareviewoftheliteratureandtwocasereports
AT offerhauschristoph thefabellasyndromeararecauseofposterolateralkneepainareviewoftheliteratureandtwocasereports
AT whitewilliamjames thefabellasyndromeararecauseofposterolateralkneepainareviewoftheliteratureandtwocasereports
AT shafizadehsven thefabellasyndromeararecauseofposterolateralkneepainareviewoftheliteratureandtwocasereports
AT becherchristoph thefabellasyndromeararecauseofposterolateralkneepainareviewoftheliteratureandtwocasereports
AT bouillonbertil thefabellasyndromeararecauseofposterolateralkneepainareviewoftheliteratureandtwocasereports
AT hoherjurgen thefabellasyndromeararecauseofposterolateralkneepainareviewoftheliteratureandtwocasereports
AT driessenarne fabellasyndromeararecauseofposterolateralkneepainareviewoftheliteratureandtwocasereports
AT balkemaurice fabellasyndromeararecauseofposterolateralkneepainareviewoftheliteratureandtwocasereports
AT offerhauschristoph fabellasyndromeararecauseofposterolateralkneepainareviewoftheliteratureandtwocasereports
AT whitewilliamjames fabellasyndromeararecauseofposterolateralkneepainareviewoftheliteratureandtwocasereports
AT shafizadehsven fabellasyndromeararecauseofposterolateralkneepainareviewoftheliteratureandtwocasereports
AT becherchristoph fabellasyndromeararecauseofposterolateralkneepainareviewoftheliteratureandtwocasereports
AT bouillonbertil fabellasyndromeararecauseofposterolateralkneepainareviewoftheliteratureandtwocasereports
AT hoherjurgen fabellasyndromeararecauseofposterolateralkneepainareviewoftheliteratureandtwocasereports