<div><p>NEW YORK (Reuters Health) - A common type of knee surgery, known as anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) reconstruction, is unlikely to cut short the career of a professional football player -- although another surgery known as simple meniscus repair might, hints research reported at the American Orthopedic Society for Sports Medicine's annual meeting in Keystone, Colorado.</p><p>Injury to the ACL, the key ligament inside the knee that helps keep it stable, is common in football players. ACL reconstruction involves replacing the torn ACL with a grafted strip of tendon.</p><p>Injury to the meniscus, the wedge of cartilage in the knee that stops the end of the thighbone from rubbing the top of the main shin bone directly, is also common among football players and often requires "meniscectomy" (surgical removal of all or part of a torn meniscus).</p><p>The effect of ACL reconstruction and/or meniscectomy on the length of an athlete's career in the NFL has not been well studied, Dr. Robert H. Brophy, assistant team physician for the St. Louis Rams football team, told Reuters Health.</p><p>To investigate, he and colleagues identified 54 NFL football players with a history of meniscus surgery, 29 with a history of ACL reconstruction, and 11 with a history of both surgeries and matched them to NFL players without these knee surgeries.</p><p>They found meniscectomy reduced the length of an NFL career by approximately 1.5 years, on average, and games played by 23. ACL surgery alone did not significantly reduce the length of years or games played in the NFL.</p><p>"We've gotten pretty good at doing ACL reconstructions and people tend to do pretty well after that surgery," Brophy told Reuters Health.</p><p>"ACL reconstruction may not have as much of a long-term effect on high performance athletes; there may be more of a long-term effect with meniscectomy than we have been thinking," added Brophy, an assistant professor in the department of orthopedic surgery at Washington University School of Medicine.</p><p>The careers of the NFL players who had both ACL reconstruction and meniscectomy were shortened on average by nearly 2 years and 32 games. Both of these surgeries "may be more detrimental to an athlete's durability than either surgery alone," Brophy said.</p><p>"With further research, we will be able to better understand how these injuries and surgeries impact an athlete's career and what can be done to improve long-term outcomes," Brophy said.</p><img src="http://admatch-syndication.mochila.com/images/ad.gif?aid=54852628&bid=informcom" /></div><div id="copyright"><div>

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