Delayed complications of treated reduced recurrent anterior dislocations of the humeral head in young adults.

Patients with recurrent anterior dislocations of the humeral head are advised to have the disability corrected by open surgical intervention. Painful and restricted motion after such a procedure is not always due to recurrence of the dislocation; it may be a consequence of changes in the articular surfaces and soft tissues of the joint-i.e., osteoarthritis. We observed that osteoarthritis was present in instances of recurrent anterior dislocations in both operative and nonoperative cases, but to a lesser degree in some of the operative cases.