INFLUENCE OF FEMORAL LENGTHENING ON HIP-JOINT SPACE IN POSTTRAUMATIC FEMORAL SHORTENING

We performed femoral lengthening for post-traumatic femoral shortening in 14 patients (10 men), The mean age was 26 (17-33) years. The callo tasis method was employed using an Orthofix or a Hifixator monolateral external fixator, The average length gained was 6 (3-13) cm, equal to 16(7-36)%, The mean narrowing ratio of the hip joint space during len gthening was 9 (0-26)% and the narrowing persisted at the final follow -up. Cases with narrowing greater than 5% had a longer time between th e development of the shortening and the lengthening than the others (p = 0.03). Our findings indicate that femoral lengthening for posttraum atic femoral shortening should be done as early as possible to prevent the development of joint space narrowing during the lengthening proce dure.