Assessment of Safe Cartilage Harvesting Quantity in the Shoulder: A Cadaveric Study

PURPOSE: To evaluate the volume and yield of morselized cartilage that can be harvested from the shoulder for immediate reimplantation and repair. METHODS: A standard arthroscopic approach was used to harvest non–load-bearing cartilage from 5 cadaveric shoulder specimens. Cartilage was separated from the humerus, grasped, added to the cartilage particulator, and morselized to form a cartilage paste. The volume of reclaimed cartilage was measured and compared with average humeral and glenoid defects. RESULTS: The total yield of cartilage paste following tissue processing that was obtained from the 5 glenohumeral joints ranged from 1.0 mL to 2.4 mL with a mean volume of 1.9 ± 0.5 mL, yielding a theoretical 18.6 cm(2) ± 5.2 cm(2) of coverage with a 1-mm monolayer. Previously reported mean glenoid defect size ranges from 1.12 cm(2) to 2.73 cm(2), while the mean humeral defect size ranges from 4.22 cm(2) to 6.00 cm(2). CONCLUSIONS: This study validated that through a single-stage surgical and processing technique it is possible to obtain a sufficient volume for re-implantable autologous morselized cartilage graft to address most glenohumeral articular cartilage defects. CLINICAL RELEVANCE: Chondrocyte grafts have been shown to be effective in cartilage repair. A single-site, single-staged procedure that uses a patient’s autologous shoulder cartilage from the same joint has the potential to reduce morbidity associated with multiple surgical sites, multistaged procedures, or nonautologous tissue in shoulder surgery.