Clinical outcome after mosaicplasty of knee articular cartilage defects of patellofemoral joint versus tibiofemoral joint

BACKGROUND: The purpose was to investigate survival of cartilage repair in the knee joint by osteochondral autograft transfer stratified by location of the lesion; patellofemoral joint (N = 26) versus the medial or lateral femoral condyles (N = 58). METHODS: For survival analyses, “failure” was defined as the event of a patient reporting a poor Lysholm score (below 65 points) or undergoing a knee replacement procedure. RESULTS: The survival distribution was not significantly different between the patellofemoral joint and the tibiofemoral joint groups. CONCLUSIONS: The current study suggest that similar long-term outcome can be expected after OAT procedures for the patellofemoral or tibiofemoral joint. LEVEL OF EVIDENCE: Therapeutic study, Level III.