title: Smoking and operative treatment of rotator cuff tear.
abstract: This registry study was set up to evaluate the effect of smoking on the pre-operative status, intraoperative findings, and post-operative status after rotator cuff reconstruction. Five hundred seventy-six consecutive shoulders with primarily arthroscopically repaired penetrating rotator cuff tear were followed up. Tobacco consumption was recorded as pack-years. Age-adjusted Constant score was used as an outcome measure. Five hundred sixty-four patients were available for 1-year follow-up (dropout rate 2%). One hundred fourteen (20%) and 450 (80%) patients were pre-operatively recorded to be smokers and non-smokers, respectively. The gender distribution did not differ between the groups (P = 0.286). The mean age of all patients was 55 years in smokers (SD 9.1) and 61 years in non-smokers (SD 9.4) (P < 0.001). There was no statistically significant difference in pre-operative Constant score (P = 0.075) or mean size of intraoperatively measured tendon tear (P = 0.290) between the groups. At final follow-up, there was a statistically significant difference in Constant scores between smokers [71 (SE 1.4)] and non-smokers [75 (SE 0.7)] (P = 0.017). The pack-years of smoking correlated with neither the Constant score (P = 0.815) nor the size of the tear (P = 0.786). We conclude that operatively treated rotator cuff tear patients who smoked were significantly younger than non-smokers, and that smoking was associated with lower post-operative Constant score.
authors.affiliation: Department of Orthopaedics and Traumatology, Turku University Hospital, Turku, Finland.
authors.forename: J
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Kukkonen
authors.forename: T
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Kauko
authors.forename: P
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Virolainen
authors.forename: V
authors.initials: V
authors.lastname: Äärimaa
mesh_terms: D000368:Aged; D001182:Arthroscopy; D016022:Case-Control Studies; D005260:Female; D005500:Follow-Up Studies; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D012042:Registries; D017006:Rotator Cuff / Q000503:physiopathology* / Q000601:surgery*; D000070636:Rotator Cuff Injuries; D012907:Smoking / Q000009:adverse effects*; D016896:Treatment Outcome