Arthroscopic Treatments for Scapholunate Ligament Injury

Wrist arthroscopy is commonly used in the diagnosis of wrist pathologies as well as the treatment of triangular fibrocartilage complex injury, intraarticular distal radius fracture, Kienböck disease, ganglion cyst, scapholunate (SL) ligament or lunotriquetral ligament injury. In the diagnosis of SL injury, arthroscopic classification was widely used with Geissler classification[1] or grading system by or European Wrist Arthroscopy Society (EWAS),[2] while in the treatment of SL ligament injury, closed pinning, open repair, or open reconstruction were common sense until the 2010s. In 2011, Mathoulin et al reported that arthroscopic capsulodesis onto the SL ligament can be a minimally invasive treatment option for the SL injury,[3] and since then, communication between the proximal carpal row and dorsal wrist capsule, the dorsal capsuloligamentous septum, was recognized as an important stabilizing structure of the proximal carpal row. Furthermore, the importance of the dorsal intercarpal ligament attachment onto the lunate surface has been re-recognized.

In this issue, the “Editor's pick” is “Arthroscopic suture anchor scapholunate capsulodesis” by Drs. Chung, Carratalá, Delgado, Kalapos, and Kakar. They described the arthroscopic suture anchor technique of SL capsulodesis with excellent clinical results. They concluded this technique is a reliable and safe technique with minimal complications and is recommended for reducible acute or chronic injury to the SL ligament complex with suspected avulsion injury. Interesting wrist papers, such as wrist arthroplasty, distal radius fracture, Kienböck disease, the cuboid bone for distal radius reconstruction, and interesting case reports, procedures, and systematic reviews are included in this issue. Do not miss them.

Publication History

Article published online:
17 July 2025

• References

• 1 Geissler WB. Arthroscopically assisted reduction of intra-articular fractures of the distal radius. Hand Clin 1995; 11 (01) 19-29
• 2 Messina JC, Van Overstraeten L, Luchetti R, Fairplay T, Mathoulin CL. The EWAS Classification of scapholunate tears: An anatomical arthroscopic study. J Wrist Surg 2013; 2 (02) 105-109
• 3 Mathoulin CL, Dauphin N, Wahegaonkar AL. Arthroscopic dorsal capsuloligamentous repair in chronic scapholunate ligament tears. Hand Clin 2011; 27 (04) 563-572 , xi