Editorial Commentary: Renaissance of Primary Anterior Cruciate Ligament Repair: Is History Repeating Itself?

In a comparative Level III study, Achtnich et al. compared suture anchor repair of acute proximal anterior cruciate ligament avulsion tears with single-bundle anterior cruciate ligament reconstruction with the quadrupled semitendinosus tendon. Short-term follow-up at a mean of 28 months showed that the between-group differences were not different. These results are encouraging but not different from other published series 25+ years ago. Only time will tell whether the long-term outcomes are identical and whether these techniques will also die a slow death. Hopefully history is not repeating itself.