Anterior cruciate ligament injury prevention and primary prevention of knee osteoarthritis

After decades of epidemiologic and mechanistic research, anterior cruciate ligament injuries are clearly a growing problem among active youth and adults. On average each year, there are approximately 113 000 ambulatory health care visits for initial care of cruciate ligament injuries and about 75 000 outpatient surgical reconstructions. Assuming that the average surgical cost of reconstruction is $25 000, then surgical costs over a 10-year period exceed $18.7 billion. The Injury Prevention Workgroup of the Arthritis Foundation's Osteoarthritis Action Alliance is in the initial stages of developing a research agenda that will identify gaps in the scientific knowledge related to injury prevention for the primary prevention of osteoarthritis. Long-term activities will include collecting and marketing best practices in injury prevention and identifying and addressing barriers and facilitators related to dissemination of effective programs.