Abstract
INTRODUCTION:
Acetabular retroversion has been implicated as a risk factor for the development of early hip osteoarthritis. In clinical practice standard osseous signs such as the cross-over sign (COS) and the posterior wall sign (PWS) are widely used to establish the diagnosis of acetabular retroversion on plain radiographs. Despite standardized radiological evaluation protocols, an increased pelvic tilt can lead to a misdiagnosis of acetabular retroversion in AP radiographs and 2D MR or CT scans. Previous studies have shown that the elimination of observer bias using a standardized methodology based on 3D-CT models and the anterior pelvic plane (APP) for the assessment of COS and PWS results in greater diagnostic accuracy. Using this method a prevalence of 28% for COS and 24% for PWS has been found in a cohort of patients with symptoms indicative of FAI, however the prevalence of both signs in asymptomatic adults remains unknown. This study therefore sought to establish the prevalence of the COS and PWS in relation to the APP in an asymptomatic population using a reliable and accurate 3 D-CT based assessment.
METHODS:
A large pool of consecutive CT scans of the pelvis undertaken in our department for conditions unrelated to disorders of the hip was available for analysis. Scans in subjects with a Harris hip score of less than 90 points were excluded leaving a sample of 100 asymptomatic subjects (200 hips) for this study. A previously established 3D analysis method designed to eliminate errors resulting from variations in the position and orientation of the pelvis during CT imaging was applied to determine in order to assess the prevalence of the COS and PWS in relation to the APP. Here, the acetabuli were defined as retroverted if either the COS, PWS or both were positive.
RESULTS:
From the total of 200 hips a positive COS was identified in 24% (48/200) and a positive PWS was detected in 6.5% (13/200) relative to the APP using the CT data. A. In male adults a COS was observed in 25.4% (29/114) and a PWS in 10.5% (12/114). In female adults a COS were observed in 22.1% (19/86) and a PWS in 1.2% (1/86).
DISCUSSION:
The high incidence of acetabular retroversion observed using an accurate 3D-CT based methodology shows that this anatomic configuration might not differ in frequency between asymptomatic individuals and patients with symptomatic FAI. Patients presenting with hip pain and evidence of FAI should therefore be subjected to strict diagnostic scrutiny, as the presence of a COS and/or PWS shows a poor correlation with the presence of symptomatic disease. In our collective of asymptomatic adults the COS showed a higher incidence than the PWS. Additionally a deficiency of the posterior acetabular wall was rare in asymptomatic adults compared to FAI patients. Therefore, the question whether an abnormal acetabular version does indeed lead to the development of osteoarthritis in all patients warrants further study. Although an association between osteoarthritis and femuro-acetabular impingement is believed to exist, long-term epidemiological studies are needed to establish the natural history of these anatomical configurations.
