Leg fracture

Description

Broken leg or leg fracture. Leg fracture means a break of one or more of three leg bones (femur, tibia and / or fibula). The fracture may be on one or several places. Sometimes part of the bone may go through the skin. Name for this injury is an open fracture, which treatment should be accessed aggressively to avoid the infection. The fracture can bleed into a neareby tissue, making bruises, and in more severe cases it comes to serious disease of limbs which is called a compartment syndrome. Damage to close nerves, tendons and blood vessels might occur due to the fracture.

Symptoms

Symptoms are pain in legs, swelling, deformities, numbness. At the moment of injury a sound of cracking can be heard.

Overview

Anamnesis will be taken and physical examination will be done. X-rays procedure can also be done. If there is a suspicion on a fracture, which is not seen on X-rays, CT scan should be done, too.

Tests

X-rays and CT scan

Specialists

Orthopedics

Therapy

If the broken bones are not put back into their position, reposition and stabilization of broken segment should be done. This could be done without a surgery (under anesthesia) during “closed reposition”, but surgical intervention is needed for certain fractures. After that, the splint or plaster are put. Analgetics may be prescribed, such as nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (brufen/ibuprofen, naproxen), paracetamol, etc.