To evaluate the clinical effect of the superficial medial collateral ligament (MCL) reconstruction with autogenous semitendinosus tendon in the treatment of the Ⅲ degree chronic medial collateral ligament injury.

A retrospective study was carried out on 28 patients with Ⅲ degree medial collateral ligament injury in Shiyan Taihe Hospital from April 2013 to April 2016. Before operation, stress radiography showed medial knee gap>5 mm compared with the contralatral knee; MRI examination showed the MCL crimping or broken. The operation method was taking ipsilateral autologous semitendinosus tendon and braided suturing the two ends. The sutured tendon penetrated from the anterior drilling hole of the tibia out from the posteromedial drilling hole, then using the guide pin taking the two ends of the tendon through the femoral tunnel and the two ends were fixed by absorbable screws. After operation, the knee function exercises were performed under the adjustable orthosis protection. The patients were followed up for 12 months or so. The stress radiography of medial side of knee, the Lyshlom score and IKDC score were used to evaluate the curative effect by paired t-test.

The differences of Lyshlom score (t=7.449), IKDC score(t=8.915), and the distance between the medial stress slice and the healthy side of the patients(t=5.014) were all statistically significant (all P<0.05).

The reconstruction of the superficial medial collateral ligament with autogenous semitendinosus tendon is effective in the treatment of the chronic injury of the medial collateral ligament.