Why is adult orthopedics not appropriate for pediatric fractures?

Children fracture should be careful not to go to adult hospitals according to the adult version of bone reduction to treatment, which is likely to bring children more serious injury. 8-year-old Jingjing (a pseudonym) from Anlu, a year ago, Jingjing playing in the park accidentally fell from the 1-meter-high platform, resulting in a fracture of the neck of the left femur. The local hospital to take the method of hollow nail fixation, Jingjing’s fracture part of the treatment. At the beginning of this year, Jingjing’s mother found that her daughter’s left leg seemed to be shorter than her right leg, so she took Jingjing to Wuhan Union Medical College Hospital for treatment. The examination found that due to the improper treatment of the fracture at that time, the epiphysis of Jingjing was damaged, affecting her bone development, and the femoral head was necrotic. Another 14-year-old child child (a pseudonym), six years ago accidentally fell and caused the right elbow joint injury, to a nearby hospital diagnosed after filming the right humerus epicondylar fracture, displacement is not obvious. Receiving physician on the arm for simple plaster fixation, let the child home. In recent years, the child’s parents found that their son’s elbow joint development is seriously deformed, was extremely external deformity. A few days ago, Tong Tong’s parents took him to Union Hospital for orthopedic surgery. Prof. Du Jingyuan of Pediatric Orthopedics Department of Xiehe Hospital was very sorry and regretful for these two little patients during the checkup. She emphasized that the treatment of children’s fracture should fully consider the continued growth and development of bones, because children’s fracture is often combined with epiphyseal injury, which will result in bone development deformities such as crooked, shortened and slanted bones, with a high rate of disability, and orthopedic surgeries are needed in the later stage of the disease. Moreover, children’s bones are in the growth stage and heal easily after fracture. Therefore, the surgical methods and internal fixation devices used in the treatment of adult fractures should not be applied to children’s fractures. Prof. Du Jingyuan also reminded that adolescents with immature bone development (before the age of 14-18 years) should be referred to pediatric orthopedic specialist clinics for fractures, so as to avoid doctors ignoring the characteristics of children’s bones and blindly treating them according to a scaled-down version of an adult fracture, which would have a negative impact on the child’s growth and development.