Cannulated Cancellous Screw and Ender’s Nail Fixation in Stable Intertrochanteric Femur Fracture in Elderly Patient With Co-Morbid Condition

Background: Intertrochanteric Femur fracture is common in elderly patient with co-morbidity.Ender and Simon Weidner popularized the concept of closed condylocephlic nailing for intertrochanteric fractures in 1970. The clinical experience of authors revealed that Ender nailing alone cannot provide secure fixation in elderly patients with osteoporosis. Aims and objectives; we conducted a study to evaluate the efficacy of a combined fixation procedure using Ender nails and a cannulated compression screw for intertrochanteric fractures. Study Design: This is a prospective observational type of study Place and duration of study: Department of orthopaedics, NHL medical college between January 2015 to June 2018 Methodology: 52 patients with intertrochanteric fractures were treated using intramedullary Ender nails and cannulated compression screw from January 2015 to june 2018. We included those patients having age ≥50 years, with multiple co- morbid conditions like diabetes, hypertension, COPD, Asthma, bleeding disorders and multiple fractures, and duration of the Intertrochanteric fracture ≤ two week. We exclude young active patients < 50 yrs age, fracture > 2 weeks duration, fracture with lateral wall comminution and open fractures. The two Ender nails of 4.5mm each were passed across the fracture site into the proximal neck. This was reinforced with a 6.5 mm cannulated compression screw passed from the sub trochanteric region, across the fracture into the head. Results; All the fractures were united within an average period of 13 weeks with a range of 10 – 13 weeks. The functional assessment was done with modified Harris hip score(Table no 1,2) and the mean was 86.3 with a range from 73 to 95 , and 26 patients were excellent, 20 patients were good , 4 patients were fair and two patients were poor with respect to total score. The analysis of this study fulfils the objectives of good functional outcome Conclusions: The Ender nailing combined with compression screw fixation in cases of intertrochanteric fractures in high risk elderly patients could achieve reliable fracture stability with minimal complications.