Anterior Knee Pain after Intramedullary Nailing for Tibial Shaft Fractures

Suk-Kyu Choo; Hyoung-Keun Oh; Hyun-Woo Choi; Jae-Gwang Song

doi:10.12671/jkfs.2011.24.1.28

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Choo, Oh, Choi, and Song: Anterior Knee Pain after Intramedullary Nailing for Tibial Shaft Fractures

Original Article

Journal of the Korean Fracture Society

Journal of the Korean Fracture Society 2011; 24(1): 28-32.

Published online: 19 January 2011

DOI: https://doi.org/10.12671/jkfs.2011.24.1.28

Anterior Knee Pain after Intramedullary Nailing for Tibial Shaft Fractures

Suk-Kyu Choo, M.D., Hyoung-Keun Oh, M.D., Hyun-Woo Choi, M.D., Jae-Gwang Song, M.D.

Department of Orthopedic Surgery, Ilsan Paik Hospital, Inje University College of Medicine, Goyang, Korea.

Address reprint requests to: Hyoung-Keun Oh, M.D. Department of Orthopedic Surgery, Ilsan Paik Hospital, Inje University College of Medicine, 2240, Daehwa-dong, Ilsanseo-gu, Goyang 411-706, Korea. Tel: 82-31-910-7968·Fax: 82-31-910-7967, osd11@paik.ac.kr

Received 26 April 2010 Revised 29 June 2010 Accepted 20 October 2010

(open-access):

This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/3.0/) which permits unrestricted non-commercial use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

Abstract

Purpose

To analyze the possible causes and incidence of the chronic anterior knee pain follow after closed intramedullary nailing for the tibial shaft fractures, in a retrospective aspect.

Materials and Methods

52 patients who treated with intramedullary nailing for the tibial shaft fractures from January 2001 to October 2008 were reviewed. We analyzed the relationship between knee pain and the variables (sex, age, types of fracture, protrusion extent of intramedullary nailing on proximal tibia). The aspects of pain, its onset and relieving time, and how much it influences on daily living were analyzed retrospectively. For categorical variables, group variences were estimated using Chi-square test.

Results

34 patients of 52 (65%) complaint of anterior knee pain followed after intramedullary nailing, and there were no statistical differences between pain and sex/age (p>0.05). Incidence of anterior knee pain becomes higher as the severity of fracture increases, but there was no statistical difference between pain and intramedullary nailing protrusion. Pain severity was mostly not influencing on daily living, and it mostly responded to conservative treatment.

Conclusion

The incidence of anterior knee pain followed after intramedullary nailing was 65%, and its severity was mostly not influencing on daily living. There were no significant differences between pain and sex, age, protrusion extent of intramedullary nailing on proximal tibia, but as the severity of frature increases, the incidence of anterior knee pain became higher.

Keywords: Tibial shaft fracture, Intramedullary nailing, Anterior knee pain

Figures and Tables

Fig. 1

This photograph shows IM nail protrusion over anterior tibial cortex.

Table 1

Characters of patients

^*p-values of <0.05 were considered the level of statistical significance difference.

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