MRI in diagnostic of soft tissue damages by fractures of lateral tibial plate

Full text: The knee is one of the most often injured joint. Fractures of tibial condyles are the most common articular damages. Koton and Berg call them "bumper" fractures the tibia plateau is vulnerable to both high- and low-energy injury mechanisms due to its vulnerable position in the lower extremity. It must bear significant weight and sustain significant impact and deceleration forces with little skeletal constraint, and has scant surrounding soft tissue and a tethered medial and lateral integument. Furthermore, the tibial plateau has relatively forgiving ligamentous attachments that must allow for a large range of motion in a single plane. Not surprisingly, given the diversity of injury, management of these fractures has come to include a wide variety of treatment strategies. traditionally, ligament injury associated with plateau fractures has been diagnosed indirectly with stress radiographs and physical examination. With increasing use of more sensitive MRI and arthroscopy, associated ligament and meniscus injuries have been found in significant percentages of plateau fractures. these soft tissue injuries consist primarily of MCL lesions, meniscal injuries, and ACL disruptions. However, studies addressing associated soft tissue injuries all agree that neither the type of plateau fracture nor the presence or absence of ligament injury correlates with the incidence of meniscal tears