Select Biomarkers on the Day of Anterior Cruciate Ligament Reconstruction Predict Poor Patient-Reported Outcomes at 2-Year Follow-Up: A Pilot Study

Table 4

Comparison of inflammatory cytokines and chondrodegenerative markers (mean ± standard deviation) evaluated on the day of ACL reconstruction between patients with IKDC scores above and below the PASS threshold of 75.9 points.

Biomarker	< PASS	≥ PASS
N	9	13	-	-
Female/Male (n)	5/4	4/9	0.38	-
Steroid/Placeb (n)	6/3	10/3	0.66	-
Age (years)	18.9 ± 3.5	19.9 ± 4.6	0.82	-
BMI (kg/m^2)	24.1 ± 3.9	24.2 ± 3.5	0.84	-
Graft (BTB/Ham)	8/1	10/3	0.62	-
Medial meniscus injury	7	7	0.38	-
Lateral meniscus injury	4	7	> 0.99	-
Bone bruise volume (mm^3)	9.19 ± 7.94	10.94 ± 10.18	0.67	0.17
COMP (μg/ml)	30.9 ± 10.2	41.9 ± 14.3	0.10	0.81
CTX-II (ng/ml)	1.16 ± 0.72	1.79 ± 2.16	0.92	0.37
uCTX-I (μg/mmol)	3.92 ± 4.08	2.91 ± 2.77	0.62	0.30
sGAG (μg/ml)	199.5 ± 70.1	275.8 ± 183.2	0.82	0.51
IL-1 (pg/ml)	5.48 ± 4.56	3.29 ± 5.80	0.02	0.41
IL-1 (pg/ml)	0.08 ± 0.09	0.55 ± 1.64	0.60	0.37
IL-1ra (pg/ml)	1,899.1 ± 3,014.8	2,621.5 ± 6,332.1	0.057	0.11
MMP-1 (ng/ml)	597.22 ± 689.63	366.96 ± 715.61	0.10	0.33
MMP-3 (ng/ml)	3,217.23 ± 4,074.67	2,744.09 ± 3,180.20	0.87	0.14
MMP-9 (ng/ml)	21.85 ± 31.59	7.71 ± 11.31	0.10	0.63
NTX-I (nM BCE)	26.6 ± 8.6	23.5 ± 7.5	0.33	0.40
TSG-6 (U)	260.9 ± 196.8	271.7 ± 129.3	0.53	0.40

Statistically significant differences denoted with bold and italics font.
Number of patients in the corticosteroid or placebo group from the original randomized trial.
There was also no difference in the number of samples below LLOD between groups.
< Pass=5/9 ersus ≥ PASS=6/13, p > 0.99.
u = urinary, the remaining biomarkers were measured in synovial fluid. Urinary CTX-II normalized to creatinine level (μg/mmol).
Cohen’s d effect sizes calculations were also performed in order to identify potentially clinically-meaningful findings within these pilot data, with d > 0.80 considered a large effect size.