Recommended Posts

In an age filled with advanced medical techniques like MRIs, artificial hearts, and laser eye surgery, one could be forgiven for believing doctors are also at least vaguely familiar with every one of your body parts. However, a new discovery by Belgian physicians has proved this assumption wrong.

As Science Daily reports, two surgeons at University Hospitals Leuven have located a new ligament in the human knee, and their findings may mean a revolution in how we treat ACL injuries. Dr. Steven Claes and Professor Dr. Johan Bellemans have spent four years trying to solve a modern medical mystery: in certain cases, patients who have had their ACL repaired still experience ?pivot shifts? in their knee, where the joint ?gives way? during physical activity.

In order to find their answer, the scientists turned to the past. In an 1879 article, a French surgeon theorized that there may exist an extra ligament in the anterior of the human knee. Using macroscopic dissection techniques on a wide range of cadavers, the Belgian duo confirmed this hypothesis. According to their findings, 97 percent of humans have something called an anterolateral ligament (ALL) in addition to their ACL, and pivot shifts stem from an injury to this previously unknown body part.

This discovery could mean a breakthrough in treating ACL injuries, which are common in sports like basketball, football, and soccer, where pivoting is common ? but don?t hold your breath for a better fix. Claes and Bellemans are hard at work figuring out surgical to techniques to repair the ALL, but Science Daily cautions that those results will only be ready in ?several years.?

source

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I saw this in the news the other night, it's odd how we're still finding parts like this even from many years of medical research.

 

Maybe one day we'll unlock the mysteries behind the brain and even find out about where consciousness comes from.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Anyone else want a turkey leg from a renaissance fair after looking at this?

 

How in the world has this been 'missed' for so long? People have been cutting up human bodies since the dawn of time.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

That's... quite a large ligament right there... How'd the hell they miss it for this long?

 

Maybe we got complacent and thought we knew every part of the body, or at least every part of the knee

Link to comment
Share on other sites

This topic is now closed to further replies.