Editorial Commentary: Rotator Cuff Repair Augmentation: Arguably the Only Meaningful Improvement in Rotator Cuff Repair Outcomes in Last 40 Years, While Being Cost-Effective.

Abstract

Rotator cuff repair (RCR) remains one of the most commonly performed orthopaedic procedures and represents a dynamic scientific evolution. This progression toward optimizing patient outcomes has certainly been nonlinear, and it requires that we ask of ourselves: have advances in RCR delivered on this promise? Advances in surgical approach, repair configuration, and the introduction of marrow stimulation have produced largely equivalent outcomes, leaving retear rates persistently high, especially for large and massive tears. To that end, structural augmentation with allograft or xenograft has emerged as a notable exception, showing lower retear rates, improved functional outcomes, and structural integrity across multiple cohorts when compared with primary RCR alone. Despite a higher upfront cost and increased operative complexity, recent cost-effectiveness analyses affirm that allograft augmentation yields an incremental cost-effectiveness ratio within acceptable thresholds. This may challenge the philosophy that augmentation ought to be reserved only for revision or complex RCR. Xenograft, while cost-effective by some estimates, may represent a significantly higher complication profile without corresponding improvements in healing or function. The accumulating evidence positions allograft structural augmentation as arguably the only advancement in RCR that has delivered on the process of improving patient outcomes, and importantly, it does so while maintaining cost effectiveness.