MECHANICAL-PROPERTIES OF VARIOUS CIRCUMFERENTIAL TENDON SUTURE TECHNIQUES

We evaluated the mechanical properties of six different circumferentia l tendon sutures with a variable number of suture strands, Seventy-two human cadaver flexor profundus tendons were cut and repaired using on ly a 6/0 polypropylene circumferential suture, The six running suture techniques mere: Simple; Simple-locking; Lembert; Halsted; Cross-stitc h; Lin-locking; using 10, 14 and 18 suture passes. The increased sutur e passes increased both tensile and gap strengths. The tensile strengt h of the Lin-locking technique (29 to 63 N) was significantly stronger than the others, followed by Cross-stitch (27 to 38 N), Halsted (21 t o 27 N), Lembert (20 to 27 N), Simple (11 to 22 N) and Simple-locking (10 to 17 N). The gap strength values were between 3 to 14N, with no s ignificant differences between the techniques. The resistance to glidi ng, as measured by work of flexion, was not affected by the number of strands, However, the Lin-locking significantly increased the resistan ce to gliding (33-36%) compared to the other techniques (6-21%); there were no significant differences between these five techniques.