To explore the short-term clinical effect of arthroscopically assisted reduction and internal fixation(ARIF) in the treatment of intra-articular knee fractures.

From May 2017 to May 2018, the patients with intra-articular knee fractures who undergone surgical treatment in Department of orthopedics, General Hospital of Ningxia Medical University were retrospectively analyzed. One hundred and twenty patients were reviewed. The patients treated by ARIF were in the observation group (n=60), and the patients treated by open reduction and internal fixation (ORIF) were in the control group (n=60). All the patients were followed up until the fractures healed completely. Intraoperative blood loss, operative time, hospitalization time, fracture healing time, postoperative serum inflammatory biomarkers, hospital for special surgery knee score (HSS), range of motion (ROM) and quality of life scores (SF-36 scores) in one month were compared by t test. The good rate was calculated by ROM and was compared by chi-square test.

The good rate was 98.3% in the observation group and 85.0% in the control group (χ² =6.982, P<0.05). Length of hospital stay and operation time in the observation group were significantly shorter than those in the control group (t=12.619, 23.351, both P<0.05). The intraoperative blood loss was significantly less than that of the control group (t=11.249, P<0.05). One month after surgery, SF-36 scores, ROM and HSS scores of the observation group were significantly higher than those of the control group (SF-36 t=25.10, ROM t=25.25, HSS t=12.25, all P <0.05). There was no significant difference in preoperative C-reactive protein (CRP), interleukin-6 (IL-6) or tumour necrosis factor alpha (TNF-α) levels between the two groups (t=0.756, 1.100, 0.702, all P >0.05). The levels of CRP, IL-6 and TNF-α in the observation group were significantly lower than those in the control group (t=4.389, 3.828 and 7.902, all P <0.05). The fracture healing time of observation group was significantly shorter than that of control group (t=11.345, P <0.05).

Arthroscope assisted reduction and internal fixation in the treatment of intra-articular knee fractures is effective and has the advantages of small trauma and quick recovery, which can be used selectively in clinical practice, but the indications should be strictly controlled.