Fractures are often fatal

LuckyLisfranc · Feb 4, 2009

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Fractures are often fatal (
http://www.6minutes.com.au/articles/z1/view.asp?id=436818)

by Michael Woodhead

People who experience any kind of low trauma fracture have an increased risk of death for at least five years, a major Australian prospective study has shown.

Over an 18 year period, the Dubbo Osteoporosis Epidemiology Study of almost 1300 fractures found that the risk of death was increased up to almost 2.5 fold after all kinds of fracture and in all age groups. In the elderly (>75), even minor fractures were associated with an increased risk of death, report the study authors from the Garvan Institute in Sydney in this week’s JAMA (301:513-521).

In most cases the increased risk of death persisted for up to five years after a fracture, and for ten years after a hip fracture. Of particular concern, say the study authors, is the finding that subsequent fractures result in a further three to four-fold increased risk of death that persists for a further five years.

They suggest that bisphosphonate treatment may help reduce mortality both directly and by preventing further fractures.

“Given these findings, more attention should be paid to non-hip. Non-vertebral fractures that constituted approximately 50% of all low-trauma fractures and were associated with more than 40% of all deaths,” they write.

The mechanism behind the increased risk of death after fractures is still uncertain, they say, but since mortality risk eventually returns to normal it may not be linked to underlying poor health.
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