Coronal alignment of the lower limb.
BACKGROUND
The coronal alignment of the lower limb is important for knee reconstruction procedures. However, normal alignment is hard to define because of its wide variation among normal individuals. Our hypothesis was that the variation in the normal anatomy as assessed by radiography is greater than commonly accepted.


METHODS
We performed anteroposterior long-leg radiographs on 100 Caucasian patients without any known knee abnormality, to determinate the femorotibial angle, coronal orientation of the distal femoral condyles, and coronal orientation of the proximal tibial condyles. All measurements were performed by the same experienced knee surgeon.


RESULTS
The mean values observed were close to the values commonly described in the Caucasian population. However, only 15-20% of the cases met the mean values of Moreland et al. (1987) for the individual items, and only 2 cases had the exact normal values. There was a wide variation for all angles measured, with a standard deviation higher than the mean value.


CONCLUSIONS
The variation in the lower limb axes is wider than commonly believed. There is a need for individual knee reconstruction which takes the specific knee axes of the patient to be operated into account.
Jenny
Jean-Yves
JY
Centre de Traumatologie et d'Orthopédie, 10 avenue Baumann, 67400 Illkirch, France. jean-yves.jenny@evc.net
Boeri
Cyril
C
Ballonzoli
Laurent
L
D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D019645:Arthroplasty, Replacement, Knee / Q000379:methods*; D005260:Female; D005269:Femur / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging; D006801:Humans; D007719:Knee Joint / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging*; D007720:Knee Prosthesis; D007866:Leg / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging*; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D013977:Tibia / Q000000981:diagnostic imaging; D014057:Tomography, X-Ray Computed