Post-HTA reinjury rates are higher than post-PTA rates but the difference is not statistically significant. For sportspeople at a regional or higher level, the time interval before the return to competition has an influence on the risk of reinjury.

II.

Ruptures of the anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) are serious, common and costly injuries. The present 12-year investigation was undertaken to examine the frequency of ACL ruptures and identify the game events that may have contributed to the cause of these injuries in male soccer players across a French district. A retrospective questionnaire was used to record the players' age at the time of injury, laterality, standard of play, playing position and injured side. The characteristics of the injury situations were described in detail to investigate the game events involved in each case. A total of 934 ruptures was reported. Significantly more ruptures were sustained in a non-contact versus a contact situation (p<0.01). Of the total number of lesions, 34.5% occurred during a pivot action. The right knee was affected more than the left knee (p<0.001), irrespective of the dominant side of the player. Certain game events reported in the injury situations were shown to be related to player's age, standard and position. While these results have confirmed observations from previous investigations on ACL ruptures in soccer, the analysis of a considerably larger number of injury cases has brought new findings to the literature as well as recommendations for future research.

With or without leucine, the rehabilitation program leads to improved muscle quality. Taking leucine appears to promote muscle recovery of the injured limb with regard to a single parameter (thigh muscle perimeter at 10cm from the patella), while the other parameters showed no significant improvement. A complementary study associating the recovery phase with other dietary supplements might help to optimize these preliminary results.

Purpose The objective of this study was to evaluate kinaesthetic proprioceptive deficit after knee anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) reconstruction in two populations of athletes, those in the post-surgery period and those in re-training during the intensive program-training phase. Methods We performed a prospective study in ACL-operated athletes without previous knee injuries, with 32 athletes in each group. Time since surgery in the operated athletes in the post-surgery group was 21 to 35 days, and between three and 9 months in the re-training group. We also analysed a control group of 32 uninjured non-operated subjects with a similar sporting level. Proprioception was evaluated using the threshold to detection of passive motion (TDPM) test with Biodex-type isokinetic equipment comparing operated knees, non-operated knees and control uninjured non-operated group. The control group was tested twice, 1 day apart to control reproducibility, using the intraclass correlation coefficient (ICC). The p -value threshold for statistical significance between different groups in hypothesis testing was <.05. Results TDPM reproducibility was excellent (right knee: ICC = 0.80, left knee: ICC =0.72). We found a bilateral kinaesthetic deficit in post-surgery patients compared to the control group ( p < 0.001 and p = 0.011), which was significantly higher on the operated side ( p = 0.001). Re-training patients had no significant difference between operated and uninjured knees, but had a kinaesthetic deficit on operated limbs ( p = 0.036) compared to the control group. Conclusion There was a bilateral deficit in post-surgery athletes with a significant difference between injured and healthy knees, which could be explained by a change in the central nervous system. Compared to the control group, a proprioceptive deficit was only seen for re-training patients on the operated side and not in the healthy limb. Kinaesthetic recovery may be faster for the uninjured side as initial deficit is lower. Level of evidence II.