The workshop
Dr Ken Cutbush and Dr Des Bokor ran a workshop for Smith and Nephew Surgical at the Shoulder and Elbow Society of Australia meeting in Melbourne in November 2014. It was well attended.
Dr Cutbush presented on repairing acute AC joint injuries using an all-arthroscopic technique, and Dr Bokor presented on arthroscopic posterior bone block surgery. A saw bone practical session followed, using the Q-fix anchor.
Pictured are Dr Cutbush, Dr Andersen, Dr Hirpara, Dr Sandow and Prof Itoi.
What SESA is, and what a workshop involves
The Shoulder and Elbow Society of Australia is the national subspecialty society for surgeons whose practice is the shoulder and elbow. Its scientific meeting is where Australian shoulder research is presented and discussed, and technique workshops of this kind are commonly held alongside the main programme.
A surgical workshop pairs short technique presentations with hands-on practice. Saw bones are synthetic bone models made to the shape of real anatomy, and they let surgeons rehearse the steps of a procedure, and handle unfamiliar instruments and implants, away from a patient. An anchor is a small device inserted into bone to hold the sutures that in turn hold tendon or ligament against it, and getting a feel for how one is inserted and tensioned is exactly what a model session is for.
The two subjects presented
The acromioclavicular joint is the small joint on top of the shoulder where the collarbone meets the shoulder blade. It is injured by falling directly onto the point of the shoulder, which can stretch or rupture the ligaments holding the collarbone down, and in more severe injuries the end of the collarbone lifts visibly. An all-arthroscopic repair addresses that through keyhole portals rather than through an open incision. Individual results vary.
A posterior bone block is a stabilising operation for instability in which the shoulder tends to come out of the back of the socket rather than the front. Bone is fixed to the back rim of the glenoid to deepen it and provide a physical stop. Posterior instability is a much less common pattern than anterior instability, which is part of why it is the sort of topic a subspecialty meeting covers rather than a general one.
Related information
- Our AC joint arthrosis page
- Our shoulder instability page
- Our shoulder injuries page
- Our post on arthroscopic ACJ reconstruction