Fractures and Osteomyelitis - Walter Flashcards
What are the three possible etiologies for a fracture?
Traumatic - violent force
Non traumatic - pathologic (metabolic, tumors etc)
Stress fracture - repetitive use
What are the three stages of fracture healing?
- Inflammatory phase (1 week)
- Reparative phase (2-3 weeks)
- Remodelling phase (1 month)
What is involved in the inflammatory phase 1?
- Immediately after fracture
- Disruption of blood vessels
- Fracture hematoma - 1) favors bone healing and removal retards healing 2) Fibrin mesh is formed - seal the the fracture site and provides scaffolding for cells
- Bone marrow shows hemorrhage and fat necrosis
- Vascular injury –> ischemia –> bone necrosis
What is involved in inflammatory phase 2
- Inflammatory infiltrate - degranulated plateletss, neutrophils and later macrophages
- Macrophages - remove red cells, necrotic fat and cell debris. Release cytokines (included are bone morphogenic proteins)
- Granulation tissue formation
- Activate osteoblasts and osteoclasts
- Soft tissue callus (PROCALLUS) is formed
What are the main steps in the reparative stage?
- Primary callus formation - reaches its maximal girth after 2-3 weeks
- Osteoprogenitor cells deposit trabeculae of woven bone
- Activated mesenchymal cells also differentiate into chondrocytes - produce fibrocartilage and hyaline
- Cartilage undergoes endochondrial ossification with organized woven bone
What are the stages involved in the Remodelling phase?
- Secondary callus (mature lamellar bone which gradually replaces the woven bone of primary callus) formation
- Callus gets reduced to the original size of the bone - osteoclasts resorb and osteoblasts lay down bone. Weight bearing areas that are not physically stressed are resorbed (I think kind of a if you dont need it you lose it kinda way). The medullary cavity is also restored
- This whole process takes several months, but its more rapid in children
- Once remodelled, it is impossibl to find the site of fracture
What are the complications of fracture healing?
1) Infection
2) Delayed union
3) Non union - pseudoarthrosis
- Delayed union or non-union are common in:
- Separation of fractured wounds
- soft tissue between fractured bone ends
- Lack of immobilization
- Pathological fractures
What is Pseudoarthrosis
Etiology?
Therapy?
- If a non-union allows too much motion along the fracture gap, the central portion of the callus undergoes cystic degeneration, and the luminal surface can be lined by synovial-like cells, creating a false joint
- Etiology:
- Widespread separation of the fractured ends
- Interposition of soft tissue between the fracure bone ends
- Lack of immobilization
- Pathological fractures eg tumor tissue
Fibrous or fibrocartlogenous connective tissue
Central portion of the callus undergoes cystic degeration - lined by synovial like cells, creating a false joint
Therapy - surgical resection with internal fixation
What is internal callus?
Callus that lies within the reparative tissue in the medulla
Internal callus is relatively well vascularized and mechanically more stable contains less cartilage and more woven bone compared to external callus
What is external callus?
This is the callus that develops around the fractured bone and is in contact with the surrounding soft tissues, including the muscles
What is the composition of normal callus and what determines this composition?
Callus is made up of bone cartilage and fibrous tissue
The composition is dependent on:
- Stability
- Vascularity
- Extent of injury
Poorly vascularized fractures have an abundance of cartilage!!!
Systemic complication of fractures?
- Shock syndrome- due to blood loss.
- Myoglobinuria, the latter occurring when there is significant muscle injury.
- Fat embolization - through the damaged venous system by disrupting the bone marrow which contains adipose tissue. Fat embolization becomes a clinical problem in severe multiple fractures and extensive orthopedic surgery.
What are the determinants of fracture healing?
- Age
- Fracture type
- Fracture site
- Extent of soft tissue
- Local factors - vascular supply, mechanical factors
- Overal health and nutrition status of patient - diabetis, calcium, phosphorous, vitamins, infections
What is osteomyelitis?
*What does it imply
This is inflammation of bone and/or marrow
It implies that there is an infection
What are the possible routes of infection of the bone or the marrow
- Blood
- Direct spread from neighbors
- Penetrating injury