Dale Says

Allograft OATS is a surgical procedure for transplanting good cartilage from a cadaver knee into a knee that has lost cartilage from osteoarthritis.

During allograft OATS, the knee is surgically opened up, to expose the affected areas. Measurements are taken of the damaged areas of the knee to confirm the size and extent of the lesion.  Once the appropriate size is determined, a cylinder-shaped dowel of bone is removed from the knee.  It is replaced by the same size cylinder-shaped dowel of bone from the cadaver knee.  In my case, this will likely involved several small dowels, since the inside of my knee is missing most of the meniscus cartilage.  Once the “plugs” are inserted, the knee is closed.

My surgeon will also perform an osteotomy, which is a realignment procedure that unloads the vulnerable or arthritic side of the knee and puts the majority of the load of the knee joint onto the underutilized cartilage on the other side of the knee.

The osteotomy will be done by wedging open the tibia (shin bone) and adding bone graft putty to create new bone growth into the wedged area.

After the allograft OATS and osteotomy, I expect to be on a home motion machine for one week, then will undergo physical therapy for around a month, while using a brace and crutches for 4-6 weeks after surgery.

Following is a link to a good description of allograft OATS with images that help explain the procedure:

http://www.pamf.org/sports/king/osteoarthritis.html