AANA25 Non-Scientific Access Pass-GENERAL SESSION: Debate Your Mentor & Passing of the Gavel (Main Stage)

Video Transcription

Video Summary

The “Debate Your Mentor” scientific session, moderated by Dr. John D. Kelley, featured lively mentor–mentee debates on contemporary sports medicine surgery topics with audience voting.<br /><br />First, Major Brian Wooderman argued for MACI in a 24-year-old soccer player with a ~2 cm medial femoral condyle osteochondral/OCD lesion, emphasizing hyaline-like cartilage restoration, evolving less-invasive techniques, expanded indications (including “sandwich” bone grafting options), and comparable outcomes to osteochondral allograft (OCA) in some series. Dr. Brian Cole countered that OCA is best for OCD because it is a single-stage procedure that replaces both cartilage and bone, supports earlier weight bearing, has strong survivorship and return-to-sport evidence, lower reoperation rates and cost, and is favored by consensus statements; he also highlighted limitations and failure patterns of MACI in bone-compromised lesions. Cole won the vote.<br /><br />Next, Buddy Savoie discussed principles for repairing massive rotator cuff tears in a 65-year-old “gym rat,” focusing on extensive releases to mobilize tendon, minimizing anchors, preserving biology/vascularity, marrow venting, convergent stitches, and selected supplementation; he noted patches can further improve healing. Lee Murphy argued for biceps transposition/rerouting as a quick, inexpensive, vascularized autograft augmentation (“bioSCR”) with emerging biomechanical/clinical support. Murphy won.<br /><br />Then Dr. John Tokish promoted arthroscopic distal tibial allograft (DTA) for shoulder instability with bone loss, while Travis Decker advocated the Latarjet for collision athletes based on decades of evidence, dynamic stabilization effects, and return-to-sport data. Decker won.<br /><br />Finally, Nick Watanabe promoted quadriceps tendon ACL grafts (less harvest morbidity, strong biomechanics, outcomes), while Kevin Bonner defended bone–patellar tendon–bone (BTB) as the “gold standard” citing registry/NFL preference and some higher revision signals for quad. Bonner won.<br /><br />The session concluded with remarks on ANA camaraderie and a presidential transition to Dr. John Kelly.

Asset Caption

Moderator: John D. Kelly IV, M.D., FAANA & Alan S. Curtis, M.D., FAANA

Keywords

Debate Your Mentor session

sports medicine surgery debates

MACI vs osteochondral allograft (OCA)

medial femoral condyle OCD lesion cartilage restoration

massive rotator cuff tear repair techniques

biceps transposition rerouting bioSCR augmentation

shoulder instability with glenoid bone loss

arthroscopic distal tibial allograft (DTA)

Latarjet procedure collision athletes

ACL graft choice quadriceps tendon vs BTB