Antibiotic prophylaxis for arthroscopy of the knee: is it necessary?
OBJECTIVE
Our purpose was to determine the incidence of infection after routine arthroscopic meniscectomy of the knee with and without preoperative prophylactic intravenous antibiotics.


METHODS
A retrospective review of 3,231 arthroscopic knee surgeries was performed at a physician-owned in-office ambulatory surgery center over a 3-year period, of which 2,780 were arthroscopic meniscectomies. The cases were evaluated with respect to the incidence of deep infection as evidenced by a positive joint aspirate. Approximately 30% of the patients had prophylactic intravenous antibiotics within 1 hour before the arthroscopic procedure.


RESULTS
The infection rate was 0.15% in those patients who received antibiotics and 0.16% in those who did not receive antibiotics (P = .59).


CONCLUSIONS
The results of this study confirm that there is no value in administering antibiotics before routine arthroscopic meniscectomy to prevent joint sepsis.


METHODS
Level III, retrospective comparative study.
Bert
Jack M
JM
Summit Orthopedics, Ltd., St. Paul, Minnesota 55102, USA.
Giannini
Debra
D
Nace
Leslie
L
D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D000758:Anesthesia / Q000379:methods; D019072:Antibiotic Prophylaxis; D001182:Arthroscopy / Q000379:methods*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007239:Infections / Q000188:drug therapy / Q000453:epidemiology; D007719:Knee Joint / Q000601:surgery*; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D011183:Postoperative Complications / Q000517:prevention & control; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D012189:Retrospective Studies