Assessment of quality of life of patients who underwent anterior cruciate ligament reconstruction and a rehabilitation program

Introduction: Quality of life can be defined as the expression of aconceptual model that tries to represent patient’s perspectivesand his/her level of satisfaction expressed by numbers. Theobjective of this study is to evaluate the parameters of quality oflife of 23 patients who underwent surgery for anterior cruciateligament reconstruction. Methods: We adopted SF-36, a generichealth-related evaluation questionnaire, to obtain informationregarding several aspects of patients’ health conditions, and theLysholm questionnaire, specific to evaluate the symptoms andfunction of the knee. The questionnaires were applied at two stagesof the treatment: pre- and postoperatively (after the rehabilitationprogram). Results: Before surgery, the Lysholm questionnairepresented the following results: excellent in 4% of the cases, goodin 22%, fair in 22%, and poor in 52%. After surgery (Lysholm e SF-36) the correlation level was approximately 44% (p = 0.041).Discussion: The correlation between the Lysholm and the SF-36questionnaires showed the following: the lower the level of pain,the higher the Lysholm score. The high scores presented by theLysholm questionnaire are directly proportional to physical andemotional aspects, and to functional capacity. Conclusion:Analysis of both questionnaires, as well as of their correlation,showed some improvement in patients´ quality of life. We werealso able to demonstrate the importance and usefulness of applyingthe two questionnaires at three different moments: before, duringand after physiotherapeutic intervention