“My husband had a ligament tear and the blood spread inside the knee. What are the repercussions?”

The actual blood spread, or bruising, should not have problems in the future.

I'd worry more about the ligament tear than the bleeding from it. Did the surgery repair the ligament?

Thanks for your question. You mentioned your husband had ligament tear with blood in the knee. The repercussions are that the knee may continue to stay swollen and painful. I would recommend that you see an Orthopedic Surgeon and a knee specialist who can take care of him and surgically repair the ligament soon.
Hope this helps.

Dr. Sathe

The important issue is the ligament torn and determining what is needed for the ligament injury.

Blood in the knee is expected following a major tear of the Anterior Cruciate Ligament, which is inside the knee joint. The blood will absorb and disappear as a normal function. Most important to occur is establish a diagnosis and this usually requires an MRI and learn the treatment options.
Dr. Emerson

There is little or no future problem from the blood, especially after having had a procedure to remove it. The question you need answered, however, is whether there will be future problems from the torn ligament and any associated cartillage damage. The answer depends partly upon details of the ligament tear and partly upon what are your husbands age and level of sport participation. That question cannot be answered except by the physician caring for his injury who knows the complete history of the injury, findings on initial and subsequent physical examinations, and results of imaging studies.

Blood inside a joint can be a common side effect of an injury to structures that may involve the inside of a joint. When you sustain an injury, you commonly bleed. If a skin injury, you see the blood, if below the skin you may see a bruise (blood under the skin) or the bleeding may deeper, ie, in a joint or in a deep muscle.

Good news!! The body is pretty clever and naturally tries to maintain joints in their normal state. So if blood develops in the joint (hemarthrosis), the body tries to resorb and digest the blood and restore the joint to normal. Most often, surgery is unnecessary to remove the blood from the joint.

Once the hemarthrosis has resolved, there are usually no long term side effects to this occurence. The only side effect would be from the injured structure, ie, ligament, cartilage, bone, etc.

Once any clots are removed, I don’t expect any long-term problems from the blood. The body will resort any remaining. From the ligament tear, there is usually a quicker onset of arthritis, so I do recommend platelet-rich plasma (prp) or stem cell injections to help prevent this.

For better or worse, like all online/phone conversations, it’s hard to accurately answer this question without a lot more detail, like how old is he, what ligament was torn, was the ligament repaired/reconstructed at the time of the surgery, where was the blood -- in the knee joint (an effusion) or just bruising all over the leg? Is your husband on any blood thinners, and does he have any medical problems?

I really can’t add much without this info, but in case this is just a general question about bleeding from a ligament tear: it is very common to get bleeding, sometimes a lot, with ligament tears. And generally, nothing needs to be done about the bleeding; the body will usually take care of the blood by eventually resorting it. I occasionallly aspirate (remove) blood from a knee after a ligament tear if the knee is so swollen with a large effusion in the knee joint that the joint is tight, the skin is stretched, and the patient is very uncomfortable. But I do this less than 5% of the time since there is a risk of infection with an aspiration. I’ve never done surgery just to remove a bloody effusion, but I suppose it’s not unreasonable depending on the details of the case, and I suspect there was another reason to operate (either to clean up torn tissue or, more commonly, to repair/fix what was torn).

Hope this helps,

Ian Duncan, MD