Abstract

Background: Synovitis of the knee can be very difficult to treat, especially when the diagnosis remains elusive. Synovitis occurs due to the various causes. We assess the patients presenting to our hospital with synovitis of the knee, who underwent arthroscopic synovial biopsy and partial arthroscopic synovectomy, and did a review of literature. Methods: This retrospective study included 25 patients with chronic synovitis of the knee presenting to our institution between July 2015 and January 2017. Inclusion criteria were patients presenting with persistent swelling of the knee, not responding to conservative measures. We excluded patients who had recurrent synovitis and patients who had septic arthritis. All patients underwent arthroscopic synovial biopsy and partial synovectomy. Pre- and post-operative VAS score was calculated. Results: In n = 5 patients, the histopathological diagnosis was tuberculosis, which improved with antituberculous drug treatment; in n = 1 patient, the diagnosis was juvenile rheumatoid arthritis; patient improved with synovectomy and NSAIDs. In n = 12 patients, the biopsy report came as chronic non-specic synovitis, 8 of these patients did well with arthroscopic synovectomy, while the other 4 had a recurrence. e average VAS score improved from 8.4 pre-surgery to 4.2 post-surgery. Conclusions: Arthroscopic synovial biopsy and synovectomy give good results in patients with chronic synovitis of the knee. It may be recommended as a treatment for chronic synovitis of the knee, which is not responding to conservative measures of treatment.

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