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THURSDAY, Jan. 24, 2019 (HealthDay News) — For patients with stable, isolated Weber B-type fibula fractures, a three-week immobilization period is noninferior to a six-week cast, according to a study published online Jan. 23 in The BMJ<\/i>.<\/p>\n
Tera Kortekangas, M.D., Ph.D., from Oulu University in Finland, and colleagues randomly assigned skeletally mature patients aged 16 years or older with an isolated Weber B-type fibula fracture and congruent ankle mortise in static ankle radiographs to either conventional six-week cast immobilization (84 patients) or three weeks in a cast (83 patients) or a simple orthosis (80 patients). A total of 212 patients completed the study.<\/p>\n
The researchers found that the mean Olerud-Molander Ankle Score was 87.6, 91.7, and 89.8 in the six-week cast, three-week cast, and three-week orthosis groups, respectively, at 52 weeks, with higher scores indicating better outcomes and fewer symptoms. At 52 weeks, the between-group difference for the three-week versus the six-week cast was 3.6 points (95 percent confidence interval, \u22121.9 to 91; P = 0.20); the between-group difference for the three-week orthosis versus the six-week cast was 1.7 (95 percent confidence interval, \u22124.0 to 7.3; P = 0.56). The confidence intervals did not include the predefined inferiority margin of \u22128.8 points.<\/p>\n
“A shorter, three-week period of immobilization, either by cast or a simple orthosis, proved noninferior to traditional six weeks of cast immobilization for patients with stable, isolated Weber B type fibula fractures,” the authors write.<\/p>\n