Do you need surgery for a full ACL rupture?
Do you need surgery for a full ACL rupture?
Despite surgical repair of ruptured ACLs being an almost automatic certainty in almost all countries on almost everyone… there is growing evidence that many don’t need surgery!
The impressive KANON trial showed that 58% of all ACL ruptures in their study healed within 5 years without surgery!
https://bmjopensem.bmj.com/content/8/Suppl_1/A3.2 
And this could be even higher with a post injury protocol currently under investigation in Australia called the Cross Bracing Method
https://burleighphysio.com.au/article/acl-cross-bracing-method/
But even if the ACL doesn’t heal, many can still recover and return to high levels of function with good rehab just as well as surgical repair!
But what about the risks of knee OA after an ACL injury! Surgery is often said to reduce this risk!
However there is currently no evidence that surgical repair reduces the rates of knee OA after ACL injury! In fact it may increase it!
However, there is no denying that some ACL ruptures are best surgically repaired to offer improved stability and function…But there is no rush to do this, or any clear predictive markers who says is best to repair or not other than time to see how things feel! So if you rupture your ACL don’t rush to surgery, rush to physio instead and give it a few months to see how it goes! 
