Doctors find totally new, undiscovered part of the human body

What's that gross-looking thing in the picture up there? Oh, just a newly discovered part of the human body, no big deal. Two surgeons at University Hospitals Leuven in Belgium have found and named a new ligament in the knee, which they dubbed the anterolateral ligament, or ALL.

You would think in the 21rst century, there wouldn't be a part of the human body science doesn't know is there. Evidently, that's not the case. The odd part about this story is, this ligament was "postulated" way back in 1879. Just not proven. Until now.

Despite successful ACL repair surgery and rehabilitation, some patients with ACL-repaired knees continue to experience so-called 'pivot shift', or episodes where the knee 'gives way' during activity. For the last four years, orthopaedic surgeons Dr Steven Claes and Professor Dr Johan Bellemans have been conducting research into serious ACL injuries in an effort to find out why. Their starting point: an 1879 article by a French surgeon that postulated the existence of an additional ligament located on the anterior of the human knee.

The anatomical society might have found the research "very refreshing", but I found their statement refreshing.

Some of the researchers' conclusions were recently published in the Journal of Anatomy. The Anatomical Society praised the research as "very refreshing" and commended the researchers for reminding the medical world that, despite the emergence of advanced technology, our knowledge of the basic anatomy of the human body is not yet exhaustive.

Sometimes, we need a reminder, we just don't know it all.
Source
Source 2

reply to post by Klassified


Hoax. There are pins holding it on. Any knee surgeon looking at countless knees for 30 years could miss something like this.

MadMax9
reply to post by Klassified

 

Hoax. There are pins holding it on. Any knee surgeon looking at countless knees for 30 years could miss something like this.

Got a source for that? I'd love to see it. If you can prove Science Daily, and MSN both wrong. That's news. You won't hurt my feelings a bit.

ETA: My bad, if that was meant to be a "phunny". Sometimes the joke goes over my head. What can I say?

Hey, it was only the 1880s (I think) that some genius put a stethoscope up against a pregnant woman's belly and heard a fetal heart beat.

Medicine is actually slow to catch on (ever hear about the guy who was laughed at for wanting doctors to wash their hands between the autopsy room and the labor room?) and slower to change.

Don't trust any of them and do your own research. Most of the time, you can get newer info off the web than they can, given they work from 5 in the morning until late and night and don't have time left over to keep up with trends or new findings.

Very interesting news. S+F!

Cue the "Science doesn't know everything, therefore [insert logical fallacy or false assumption here]" crowd.

Anyone else getting hungry looking at the pic? reminds me of ribs

Amazing OP S&F

reply to post by Klassified


Great find! S&F for you.

AliceBleachWhite

Very interesting news. S+F!

Cue the "Science doesn't know everything, therefore [insert logical fallacy or false assumption here]" crowd.

I hope they never know everything. It would be a real bummer to have nothing left to discover. :-)

As both a student of human anatomy and someone that has had knee surgery in his youth, this is quite fascinating. I wasn't expecting the next discovery to be structural, but physiological.

reply to post by Klassified

MadMax9

 

Hoax. There are pins holding it on. Any knee surgeon looking at countless knees for 30 years could miss something like this.

Klassified

 

Got a source for that? I'd love to see it. If you can prove Science Daily, and MSN both wrong. That's news. You won't hurt my feelings a bit.

I think MadMax9 meant that as a phunny. He forgot the "Bazzinga".

reply to post by AliceBleachWhite

Cue the "Science does know everything, so why bother living boring life anymore on this earth" crowd
If we think we know answers to most of the questions, it's strong indication that there's something really wrong with us.

reply to post by Galileo400

I wondered about that after I replied to him. But I wasn't sure. Thanks for the confirmation.

Everyone likely figured that it was already found. Sort of like looking up in the sky and saying, "look a star, wonder what it is called", then walking away without another thought. I wonder how many doctors repaired said ligament without another thought also. Just because it wasn't officially named doesn't mean it has been ignored.

Great article though! Thanx OP for sharing! Science is my one true love.

S&F. You would think we knew how we worked, but we don't even know without someone telling us.

I don't profess to claim any further knowledge about the matter, but I find this really hard to believe for some reason. I think with the countless dissections of cadavers, and countless knee operations conducted around the world every year, it seems unbelievable that no-one has ever seen it and said "hey, what's that?"

I mean, if it was finding something deep within the brain, or more particularly a new function or capacity of the brain, I would find it plausible. But ligaments aren't exactly hidden away from people probing around in knees, or dissecting them on a table. And they're not exactly theoretical in nature, like our understanding of some functions of the brain.

Maybe it was always considered to be a part of the LCL, given that they seem to join at a common point? Like I said, I have no deeper knowledge one way or another. I just find this hard to believe???

Regards,
Rewey

Here's what I mean - when I look at this image below, it refers to the lateral collateral ligaments - as in plural. It seems to show the LCL as reaching down in two separate strands, hence why maybe it's referred to in plural form. This seems like exactly what is shown as the 'new' tendon in the photos in the OP.

In the pic below, one strand of the LCL joins to the outer top edge of the tibia, and one to the outer top edge of the fibula. I think the photo in the OP shows the same thing - it's just that the tibia and fibula in the photo are still joined by tissue and cartilage, and therefore maybe it isn't as clear?

I think this seems less a matter of discovering a NEW ligament, and more along the lines of realising that it performs a slightly different function to what we assumed, and therefore have given it another name?



Regards,
Rewey

Rewey
Here's what I mean - when I look at this image below, it refers to the lateral collateral ligaments - as in plural. It seems to show the LCL as reaching down in two separate strands, hence why maybe it's referred to in plural form. This seems like exactly what is shown as the 'new' tendon in the photos in the OP.

I think this seems less a matter of discovering a NEW ligament, and more along the lines of realising that it performs a slightly different function to what we assumed, and therefore have given it another name?

Regards,
Rewey

I believe you are right, they knew it was there and considered it a branch of the same ligament. Just never saw the separate function so never named it.

Unimaginable that it was never observed during the millions of ACL's and total knew surgeries.

I've circled the two shin bones as I see them in the original photo from the OP. I seriously think it shows exactly what is in the later diagram I posted.

Again - I have no deeper medical or anatomical knowledge. Just what it seems like to me.

Knowing what sports science is like in Australia, the skeptic in me thinks maybe someone is 'inventing' a new condition that will require elite sportspeople and sports clubs to pay lots more money to treat?



Regards,
Rewey

reply to post by Rewey

Makes sense to me, but then I don't have any real knowledge of anatomy, either.

Klassified

MadMax9
reply to post by Klassified

 

Hoax. There are pins holding it on. Any knee surgeon looking at countless knees for 30 years could miss something like this.

Got a source for that? I'd love to see it. If you can prove Science Daily, and MSN both wrong. That's news. You won't hurt my feelings a bit.

ETA: My bad, if that was meant to be a "phunny". Sometimes the joke goes over my head. What can I say?

edit on 11/7/2013 by Klassified because: eta

Now that was hardcore.

Thank you for the thread and thank you for humiliating 3 other cynical human beings.

S&F mate!