The main finding of the present study is that there are significant differences in bony morphology between patients with PCL avulsion fracture and those without. A smaller notch width index (coronal) in women was found to be related to PCL avulsion fracture. These results also demonstrated that the knee morphological measurements, which were mostly associated with the risk of sustaining a PCL avulsion fracture, differ between men and women.
Many studies have been performed previously to identify potential risk factors in ACL and PCL injuries, and the femoral notch has been the main topic of interest. Domzalski et al. [22] have suggested that a smaller notch width index can be correlated to an ACL rupture. Recently, van Kuijk et al. reported that a smaller and more sharply angled intercondylar notch is related to PCL rupture [13]. Interestingly, the findings of that study were consistent with the findings in our present study. In our study, notch width index (coronal) was also found to be an independent factor in women, This means that a smaller notch width index (coronal) may render the knee more susceptible to a PCL avulsion fracture. Previous research has shown that patients with smaller intercondylar notch also have smaller ACL and PCL [23, 24]. Moreover, a smaller PCL can resist less force than a larger PCL [13]. Therefore, a patient with a smaller intercondylar notch also has a smaller PCL, which may increase the risk of the avulsion fracture. The morphology of the intercondylar notch plays an important role in both PCL injury and PCL avulsion fracture. Further research is needed to better understand this relationship.
Previous studies have shown that the posterior tibial slope is significantly correlated with non-contact ACL and PCL injuries. A larger posterior tibial slope increases the risk of ACL rupture [8–10], while a smaller posterior tibial slope increases the risk of PCL rupture [14]. The mechanism of injury in ACL rupture shows an increase of tibial slope, leading to an increase of tibial forward displacement and stress in the ACL with weight-bearing activity [11, 25]. Similarly, under conditions where the tibia bears axial load and backward external force, the reduction of the tibial slope leads to an increase of the stress in the PCL which leads to rupture. Therefore, the increase of the tibial slope has a protective effect on the PCL, and the researchers found that a 1-degree increase in the posterior tibial slope decreased PCL force by 6 N [26–29]. Bernhardson et al. confirmed the above opinions and they found that a decreased posterior tibial slope was associated with patients who have PCL tears [14]. Although our study showed that the medial/lateral posterior tibial slopes were not risk factors, the medial posterior tibial slopes (p = 0.05) and lateral posterior tibial slopes (p = 0.041) of the case group were larger than those of the control group in women. Our results seem to contradict the study of Bernhardson. However, those two studies have different research subjects. PCL ruptures occur in the ligament portion, while PCL avulsion fractures occur in the bone tissue at the tibial insertion of the PCL. We believe that the posterior tibial slope plays an important role in the occurrence of these two conditions. When a sufficiently large retrograde force is applied to the proximal tibia, PCL rupture is prone to occur when the tibial slope is smaller. However, a PCL avulsion fracture is more prone to occur when the tibial slope is larger. Other factors such as the acceleration of direct force and the degree of osteoporosis may also play important roles in the occurrence of PCL avulsion fractures. Therefore, further studies are needed to verify the above hypothesis, such as a comparative study on the morphological parameters of the knee joint, especially the posterior tibial slope, between the PCL rupture group and the PCL avulsion fracture group.
Despite a considerable scientific effort to optimize surgical treatment, PCL injuries still cause a high degree of health impairment and involve high economic costs. This has served as the motivation for studies that focused on determining potential risk factors associated with PCL avulsion fracture. Because of the low prevalence of PCL avulsion fracture, screening only to determine the risk of sustaining a PCL avulsion fracture would likely not be cost efficient. However, several studies on the relationship between morphological measurements and traumatic diseases of the knee including ACL injury [6–10], ramp lesion of meniscus [11], and tibial spine avulsion fractures [12], PCL injury [13, 14], have already been conducted, and more risk factors have been associated with knee-related sports injuries. All of these risk factors could be combined as a menu to find and help patients at risk for different types of knee injury [13]. For example, patients with smaller notch width index are more prone to ACL and PCL injuries, and PCL avulsion fractures. We think that more similar studies should be carried out in the future to discover more risk factors of other knee injuries so as to expand and enrich this menu. Furthermore, understanding knee morphology may have implications for PCL avulsion fracture mechanism, strategies for injury prevention, and perhaps treatment and prognosis.
Previous studies mainly focused on the surgical technique or clinical outcomes of this injury [3–5]. To our knowledge, our study is the first to identify the association between MRI measurements of the knee and PCL avulsion fracture and find the independent factor that may help explain the risk of PCL avulsion fracture and the predisposition of patients toward knee injury. The current report suggested that there exist independent risk factors of smaller notch width index (coronal) in women, which may render the knee more susceptible to PCL avulsion fracture. In addition, we believed that MRI was superior to CT and radiographs in measuring morphological parameters. The advantages of MRI include the ability to visualize the surface geometry of the articular cartilage, which allows better visibility of the functional point of tibial slope, absence of ionizing radiation, and excellent soft tissue contrast. Furthermore, MRI has been proven as the gold standard method of choice for noninvasive evaluation of ligament injuries, including those of the ACL and PCL, which can be used to exclude patients with complicated ACL or PCL injuries.
Our study had several limitations. First, this was a retrospective, single-center study, and the small sample size might have led to a selection bias. Second, while patients were matched for age and sex, they were not matched for height, weight, and levels and styles of external force. The absence of this information may confound our data. Third, some measurements could not be performed because of the fracture. For instance, the angle consisting of the superior and posterior margins of the tibial intercondylar eminence in sagittal sequence, which we called the posterior angle of intercondylar eminence, may be strongly associated with PCL avulsion fracture. Fourth, age may be an important factor. The femoral intercondylar notch may have bony hyperplasia, and the measurements of the intercondylar notch showed a difference as age increased. However, we did not take age into account in our study. Lastly, 20 patients had a complication of posterior root tears of the medial meniscus in the case group. However, the menisci play a role in anteroposterior stability of the knee joint and may influence the functional tibial slope [10, 30]. In the present study, we ignored the effects of the menisci on tibial slope.