Authors: Tim Barlow Piyush Upadhyay David Barlow
Publish Date: 2013/02/20
Volume: 24, Issue: 2, Pages: 143-148
Abstract
Non or malunion of the clavicle is reported to occur in up to 15 of conservatively treated fractures the purpose of this systematic review is to examine the evidence for the use of external fixation in the treatment of clavicular nonunion We performed a search of MEDLINE and Embase including all papers using external fixators for the treatment of clavicular nonunion Four papers satisfied our eligibility criteria three case series and one case–control study Level of evidence and quality assessment scoring were performed using published methods Due to the heterogeneity of the study populations and interventions no attempt at metaanalysis was made External fixation in hypertrophic nonunion of the clavicle but not atrophic nonunion appears to be a reasonable treatment option A pragmatic multicentre randomised controlled trial comparing external fixation and open reduction internal fixation in the treatment of hypertrophic nonunion of the clavicle would be valuable
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