Results of this study highlight preoperative Simple Shoulder Test score, external rotation and labor-intensive occupation as factors associated with a lower American Shoulder and Elbow Surgeons score after structural failure of repaired rotator cuff tears.  

“Successful outcomes were achieved in 54% of patients with failed rotator cuff repair. Those who self-identified their occupation as being labor-intensive represented a special group of patients who are at high risk for a poor outcome after a failed rotator cuff repair,” Surena Namdari, MD, MSc, and colleagues, wrote in their study.
To determine the factors related to clinical outcomes following failed repair, Namdari’s team retrospectively studied 61 patients with a minimum 2-year follow-up who underwent arthroscopic repair of full-thickness rotator cuff tears and had structural failure within 1 year of the repair. The investigators categorized patients with an American Shoulder and Elbow Surgeons (ASES) score of 80 or higher as having a successful clinical outcome and those with a score below 80 as having an unsuccessful outcome.
Of the 28 patients in the unsuccessful group, 15 (53.6%) reported having a labor-intensive profession as opposed to two (6.1%) of the 33 patients in the successful group. Seven patients, all from the unsuccessful group, had their preoperative ASES score decline by a mean of 6.6 points postoperatively. The investigators also found that patients in the unsuccessful group had significantly lower Simple Shoulder Test (SST) scores compared to the successful group, who had lower postoperative ASES pain scores. – by Christian Ingram

Disclosure: One or more of the authors received payments or services from a third party in support of an aspect of this work. In addition, one or more of the authors has had a financial relationship in the 36 months prior to submission of this work with an entity in the biomedical arena that could be perceived to influence or have the potential to influence what is written in this work.