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The Trufit plug has two layers. The top layer has properties similar to cartilage and the lower layer has properties similar to bone. The bilayered structure has mechanical properties that approximately match the adjacent cartilage and bone. Surgeons inserted the plug in the knees of 26 patients with donor lesions from OATS procedures and followed up with imaging studies (with MRI and T2-mapping) at various intervals for a period of 39 months.

"Quantitative MRI, when combined with morphologic assessment, allows us to understand the natural history of these repair techniques and define those patients who are most likely to benefit from the surgery," said Hollis Potter, M.D., chief of the Division of Magnetic Resonance Imaging, director of Research in the Department of Radiology and Imaging at Hospital for Special Surgery and lead author of the study. "We gain knowledge about the biology of integration with the host tissue, as well as the repair tissue biochemistry, all by a noninvasive imaging technique."

"What we found was that the plug demonstrated a predictable process of maturation on imaging studies that paralleled the biology of their incorporation," Dr. Bedi said. "With increasing postoperative duration, the repair tissue demonstrated encouraging properties with T2-values that resembled native articular cartilage."

Dr. Williams, Dr. Bedi and other surgeons at Hospital for Special Surgery are involved in ongoing studies to investigate the efficacy of the TruFit plug in treating primary cartilage defects as well. "What is unique about this study is that we have serial MRI with T2 mapping at various time points after surgery, which allows us to really examine the natural history of plug incorporation," Dr. Bedi said.

Dr. Williams believes that there is a role for scaffold-based cartilage repair strategies in the treatment of symptomatic cartilage lesions. "It is our hope that
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