Does radiofrequency ablation (RFA) epiphysiodesis affect adjacent joint cartilage?
basic_science · Level V
Where this comes from
- Record sourced from PubMed, PMID 27278056.
- Also identified by DOI 10.1007/s11832-016-0747-3 and PMC identifier 4940242.
- Licence recorded as CC BY.
- The licence permits redistribution, so the abstract is shown in full and the full text is available from the publisher.
Abstract
To test the hypothesis that epiphysiodesis made with radiofrequency ablation (RFA) is a safe procedure that disrupts the growth plate without damaging the adjacent joint articular cartilage. RFA epiphysiodesis was done during 8 min in vivo in 40 growing pig tibia physis. In addition, three tibiae were ablated for 16 min and three more for 24 min. As a burned cartilage reference, six tibiae were ablated on the joint articular cartilage for 8 min. After the procedure, the animals were terminated and the tibiae were harvested. Magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) was done ex vivo to evaluate the joint articular cartilage in all samples. We used T1-weighted, T2-weighted, and water content sequences under a 1.5 T magnetic field. On the burned articular cartilage, intensity changes were observed at MRI. We found no evidence of articular cartilage damage on the 40 8-min RFA procedures. The tibiae ablated for 16 min and 24 min showed intact joint cartilage. Epiphysiodesis using RFA is safe for the adjacent articular cartilage. This study shows that RFA can be done safely in the growing physis of pigs, even with triple duration procedures.