Recurrent post-traumatic anterior shoulder dislocation - open versus arthroscopic repair

A total of 41 consecutive patients (II women and 30 men, median age 29 (18- 51) years) with unilateral, isolated, posttraumatic, recurrent anterior sho ulder dislocation and a Bankart lesion were operatively repaired, either by an arthroscopic technique including a capsular plication, or by an open pr ocedure with Mitec anchors. All the patients were followed prospectively an d evaluated after a median of 36 (30-52) months follow-up by a "blind" obse rver. Nineteen patients in each group had excellent or good results, and on e in each group was graded as fair. One patient in the arthroscopic group h ad a traumatic dislocation 5 months after the operation and was graded as p oor. Three patients experienced subluxations postoperatively, one in the ar throscopic and two in the open group. There was no significant difference i n anterior-posterior shoulder laxity measured objectively with Donjoy. The open Bankart repair group had a statistically significantly longer hospital ization (P = 0.001), a slight decrease in external range of motion, and mor e frequent cosmetic complaints. Apart from this, the results revealed no ma jor differences between the two methods after a median of 36 months in this selected group of patients with longstanding problems.