Antibiotic prophylaxis for arthroscopy of the knee: is it necessary?

PURPOSE: Our purpose was to determine the incidence of infection after routine arthroscopic meniscectomy of the knee with and without preoperative prophylactic intravenous antibiotics.

METHODS: A retrospective review of 3,231 arthroscopic knee surgeries was performed at a physician-owned in-office ambulatory surgery center over a 3-year period, of which 2,780 were arthroscopic meniscectomies. The cases were evaluated with respect to the incidence of deep infection as evidenced by a positive joint aspirate. Approximately 30% of the patients had prophylactic intravenous antibiotics within 1 hour before the arthroscopic procedure.

RESULTS: The infection rate was 0.15% in those patients who received antibiotics and 0.16% in those who did not receive antibiotics (P = .59).

CONCLUSIONS: The results of this study confirm that there is no value in administering antibiotics before routine arthroscopic meniscectomy to prevent joint sepsis.

LEVEL OF EVIDENCE: Level III, retrospective comparative study.