Repair and reconstruction of traumatic deficiency of the triceps

It has been estimated that triceps tendon ruptures represent less than 1% of all tendon ruptures. Despite its uncommon occurrence, the practicing orthopedic surgeon will likely be faced with the management of either the acute or the chronic triceps tendon rupture during the span of his career. The aim of this article is (1) to describe the technique used to repair acute triceps tendon ruptures and (2) to describe the techniques used to reconstruct the deficient acute tendon rupture or the chronic tendon rupture.Repair of the acute triceps tendon rupture consists of advancement of triceps with placement of a locking nonabsorbable suture through tendon and passing these through drill holes into the olecranon. Reconstruction of the tendon may involve augmentation of the repair with hamstring tendon autograft or Achilles tendon allograft. We have used the currently described triceps repair technique at the authors' institution to surgically treat 10 acute triceps avulsions in 9 patients. The mean time to surgery was 12 days (range, 1 day-44 days). Two elbows required subsequent reoperations. At an average follow-up of 1.4 years, all but 1 patient had returned to preinjury occupation.