Description
Medial open-wedge high tibial osteotomy (MOWHTO) is a widely performed surgical procedure for patients with varus malalignment and medial compartment knee osteoarthritis (OA). Good long-term clinical results have been reported (10-year survival rate of 90%) [1]. The reported complications of MOWHTO include patella baja, hinge fracture, non-union, infection, and hardware-related irritation [2,3,4]. Many studies have reported patella baja after MOWHTO as a major complication of the procedure (incidence rate: 80%–100%) [5,6]. Patellar height is reduced during MOWHTO because of distalization of the tuberosity [7]. In general, the change in patellar height had finished at direct postoperatively. However, El-Azab et al. reported a significant decrease in patellar height at direct postoperatively compared with before surgery, and the number of patellar infera cases increased before removal of the hardware compared with direct postoperatively[8]. Moreover, some scholars have reported that patellar tendon contracture may reduce patellar height after OWHTO [9,10,11]. Therefore, in this study, we measured patellar height sequentially after MOWHTO to determine when patellar height change occur. We hypothesized that the patellar height changes sequentially after MOWHTO. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the sequential changes in patellar height and the factors that contribute to these changes after MOWHTO.
