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Radiologic measurement of lesser trochanter and its clinical significance in Chinese

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Abstract

Objective

Femoral fracture is a major cause of morbidity and mortality in elderly persons. Surgery, the main choice of treatment of femoral fracture, may result in some complications severely affecting patients’ daily activities due to femoral malalignment. The lesser trochanter is an important anatomical structure of the femur which could be used as an anatomical landmark during and after operation to evaluate femoral alignment. To predict femoral rotational malalignment during surgery, the relationship between the height and width of the lesser trochanter and femoral rotation at different angles was investigated.

Methods

Fifty healthy adult volunteers (25 men and 25 women) were enrolled in this study and a total of 900 radiographs of proximal femurs were taken in the following positions: neutral position, 5°, 10°, 15°, and 20° internal rotation, and 5°, 10°, 15°, and 20° external rotation, respectively. The cranio-caudal and transverse diameters of the lesser trochanter were obtained on a PACS Workstation.

Results

The height and width of the lesser trochanter increased with external rotation and decreased with internal rotation and the values showed statistical significance between different positions or different genders. Between 20° of internal rotation to 20° of external rotation, the mean height increased from 0.58 cm to 1.23 cm in men and from 0.44 cm to 1.19 cm in women. The corresponding mean values for width were from 2.53 cm to 4.44 cm in men, and from 2.08 cm to 3.86 cm in women, respectively. The height and width of the lesser trochanter were both highly correlated to the position of femur and the linear relationship was established approximately. The morphological alteration of lesser trochanter also changed obviously when the femurs rotated.

Conclusions

The height and width of the lesser trochanter is linearly related to femoral rotation and could be used as a reference for prevention of femoral malalignment during surgery.

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Acknowledgements

The authors wish to thank Dr. Linxiang Bi and Dr. Yanling Su for their valuable input and efforts that have made significant improvement of the manuscript. Special thanks also go to Dr. Jianbo Liu and Dr. Xiaoling Zhang for their suggestions and work on the part of data analysis.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Orthopaedics, 3rd Hospital, Hebei Medical University, Shijiazhuang, Hebei, 050051, People’s Republic of China

    Qi Zhang, Wei Chen, Xicheng Li, Zhaohui Song, Jinshe Pan & Yingze Zhang

  2. Deparment of Radiology, 2nd Hospital, Hebei Medical University, Shijiazhuang, Hebei, 050051, People’s Republic of China

    Huaijun Liu

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  1. Qi Zhang
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  2. Huaijun Liu
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  3. Wei Chen
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  4. Xicheng Li
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  5. Zhaohui Song
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  6. Jinshe Pan
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  7. Yingze Zhang
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Correspondence to Yingze Zhang.

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Zhang, Q., Liu, H., Chen, W. et al. Radiologic measurement of lesser trochanter and its clinical significance in Chinese. Skeletal Radiol 38, 1175–1181 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00256-009-0662-5

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00256-009-0662-5

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