Background
The treatment of femoral shaft fractures has always been a focus of interest, but until now has remained a clinical problem and a subject of controversy. The aim of this work was to evaluate the role of static interlocked nailing in the treatment of a comminuted fracture of the femoral shaft in our initial cases managed by this technique at Al-Azhar University Hospitals.
Patients and methods
The results of treatment of comminuted fractures of the femoral shaft with static interlocking nailing were reviewed retrospectively in 60 patients. Ten of them had bilateral fractures, which allowed 70 fractures to be reviewed.
Results
All managed fractures (100%) had healed without conversion to dynamic intramedullary fixation. No broken nails were detected. At the final postoperative follow-up evaluation according to Thoresen and colleagues, we obtained excellent and good results in 65 (92.85%) femoral fractures, fair results in five (7.15%) femoral fractures, and no (0%) poor result. We had 100% fracture union in all cases with a mean time of eight postoperative months.
Complications
Only one (1.4%) patient had deep infection. Eight (11.4%) patients had pulmonary embolism, which was the major cause of morbidity associated with bed recumbence in our study.
Conclusion
We concluded that this method of treatment — static intramedullary nailing fixation — for comminuted shaft fractures of the femur is an effective method that maintains the length and alignment, with a low incidence of complications.