Individuals who sustain nonosteoporotic fractures continue to also sustain fragility fractures

Summary

This retrospective case control study was done in order to investigate whether patients who sustain a “nonosteoporotic fracture” early in life also continue to sustain fragility fractures later in life. All patients who had been treated at the Department of Orthopedics in Malmo with a tibial shaft fracture from 1949 to 1963 (n = 767) or an ankle fracture from 1961 to 1965 (n = 786) were included in this study. At the time of follow-up in 1992, 231 of the patients who sustained a tibial shaft fracture and 260 of the patients who sustained an ankle fracture were still living in the city of Malmö. Objective registration was done of all subsequent fractures that these former patients had sustained. Comparison was done with corresponding data from double numbers of age- and sex-matched controls who at that time (1950s and 1960s) had no such fractures. At the time of the fracture as well as today, the controls were living in the area of Malmö. Individuals with earlier tibial or ankle fractures had an increased incidence of fractures generally classified as fragility fractures. There was no difference in this respect between men and women, nor whether the initial fracture had been diaphyseal or metaphyseal. We conclude that sustenance of fractures early in life may serve as a predictor for fragility fractures later in life.