Shoulder Synovitis Does not Affect Pain After Arthroscopic Rotator Cuff Repair

Background: The goal of this study was to determine if there is an association between glenohumeral synovitis andearly post-operative pain after arthroscopic rotator cuff repair.Methods: Fifty patients with symptomatic rotator cuff tears were prospectively enrolled prior to RCR. Baseline ASESscore, VAS Pain score, forward elevation, and external rotation were recorded. Intra-operatively, synovitis was gradedon a scale of zero to six as based on a previously validated scoring system. VAS Pain scores were obtained frompatients post-operatively on days one through 14, week 6, and 3 months.Results: Average intra-operative synovitis score was 2.4 ± 1.6. No significant correlation was found between synovitisscore and pre-operative forward elevation (P=0.171), external rotation (P=0.126), VAS Pain (P=0.623), or ASES(P=0.187) scores. No significant correlation was found between synovitis score and post-operative VAS Pain level atany time point. There was a moderate correlation between both pre-operative VAS Pain and ASES scores and postoperativeVAS Pain in the first post-operative week. Workers’ compensation patients had worse pain at 3 months postoperativelycompared to non-workers compensation patients (P=0.038).Conclusion: This study reveals that macroscopically assessed glenohumeral synovitis does not have any significantcorrelation with pre-operative or post-operative pain in patients undergoing arthroscopic rotator cuff repair; althoughhigher pre-operative pain levels, worse pre-operative ASES scores, and workers compensation status do influencepost-operative pain levels in arthroscopic rotator cuff repair.Level of evidence: III