Article Sidebar
Article Details
Authors submitting articles to The Annals of African Surgery do so on the understanding that if accepted, they will retain the copyright and allow the journal to publish and archive the article under the CC BY (Creative Commons Attribution License) 4.0 International. See details on the Creative commons website. All authors will be required to sign an Author Agreement form detailing the agreement with the journal prior to the article being published. Download the form here
This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
Main Article Content
Treatment and Outcome of Ankle Fractures at the Moi Teaching and Referral Hospital
Abstract
Background: Ankle fractures are common and protocols for their management are generally well established. Despite this, a significant proportion of the patients get unfavourable outcomes after being managed for this injury. This study looked at the treatment options offered and their outcome at our unit.
Methodology: A prospective study was conducted to examine ankle fracture patients presenting at our unit from 1st November 2009 to 30th April 2011. All patients were followed up was for 6 months where clinical and radiological evaluations recorded to determine outcome.
Results: The mean age of patients was 47years with the ratio of female to male being 1.5:1. An infection rate of 10% in patients treated by ORIF and 33.3% in open fractures was documented. At 6 months follow up, there was a higher rate of complications in the unstable fractures treated non-operatively (92.3%) compared to unstable fractures treated surgically (37.7%) (p<0.001).
Conclusion: The rate of infection after surgical management was high and measures are required to mitigate this. The unstable ankle fractures treated non-operatively have a high rate of complications and should be managed operatively.
Key Words: Ankle fractures, Treatment outcome, Developing country
