Arthroscopic Intra-articular Biceps Tenodesis With All-Suture Anchor

TL;DR

This paper describes a minimally invasive surgical technique for treating biceps tendon issues in the shoulder using arthroscopic tenodesis with an all-suture anchor.

Contribution

The novel contribution is a specific arthroscopic technique using a top-of-the-groove all-suture anchor for biceps tenodesis.

Findings

The technique is time-efficient, cost-effective, and allows for easy tension maintenance during surgery.

Clinical results using this method have been excellent with no reported cases of tenodesis failure.

The technique is suitable for various biceps-related pathologies and has shown comparable outcomes to other tenodesis methods.

Abstract

Biceps tenodesis can be used to treat both superior labral anterior and posterior (SLAP) tears and degenerative biceps pathologies in the setting of rotator cuff pathology or as stand-alone techniques. Research has shown that arthroscopic biceps tenodesis has comparable outcomes to open tenodesis with the benefit of being less invasive.

Surgical indications for intra-articular tenodesis of the long head of the biceps (LHB) include SLAP tear, failed SLAP repair, partial-thickness LHB tear, biceps instability, tenosynovitis, and clinical examination consistent with LHB pain.

We present our technique for arthroscopic intra-articular biceps tenodesis with a top-of-the-groove all-suture anchor using percutaneous suture passage with a spinal needle and polydioxanone suture. Sutures are shuttled through the LHB in situ before releasing the tendon from the labrum.

The authors have seen excellent clinical results using this method without any cases of tenodesis failure. Prior studies have shown subpectoral, suprapectoral, and top-of-the-groove biceps tenodesis to have similar good clinical outcomes at multiple time points.

This technique is advantageous as it is time efficient and cost-effective, and tension on the biceps can be easily maintained as suture is passed through the tendon in situ before the tendon is released from the superior labrum.

The author(s) attests that consent has been obtained from any patient(s) appearing in this publication. If the individual may be identifiable, the author(s) has included a statement of release or other written form of approval from the patient(s) with this submission for publication.

Graphical AbstractThis is a visual representation of the abstract.

This is a visual representation of the abstract.

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