Supracondylar humeral fractures--a review of the outcome of treatment.

Fractures around the elbow are common injuries in children. We studied 77 children who had sustained supracondylar fractures around the elbow during the period 1989-1993. The aim of this study was to compare the outcomes of supracondylar fractures following 3 modes of treatment, namely manipulation and reduction, open reduction with internal fixation and percutaneous pinning. In our study, we have found that the most common cause for injury in supracondylar fractures was a fall on the outstretched hand. A possible reason would be that children usually try to break the force of a fall by extending their elbows. Treatment results in all 3 groups were satisfactory in this study. There were no vascular problems or Volkmann's contractures. For operative treatment, percutaneous pinning had the most consistent outcome in terms of restoration of function and cosmesis. Open reduction and internal fixation as a method of treatment had poor outcome for both function and cosmesis.