Prevention of excessive medialisation of trochanteric fracture by a buttress screw: A novel method and finite element analysis

Abstract

© 2014, Medical Association of Thailand. All Rights Reserved. This paper proposes a novel method of using an antero-posterior buttress screw at the distal fragment just below the fracture site in conjunction with the sliding hip screw (SHS) to resist excessive femoral medialisation. A virtual assessment of the effectiveness of this new method was performed using the finite element analysis. The results indicate that the use of a sliding hip screw (SHS) combined with a buttress screw can help resist femoral medialisation better than using an SHS with no buttress screw. The von Mises equivalent stress (EQV) was found to be in a safe range, which indicates increased integrity of the lateral wall with the addition of the buttress screw.