Researchers believe the reason why ankle fractures lead to death in so many cases is two-fold. 82 percent had hypertension, 73 percent had diabetes, 50 percent had chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, nearly half had heart disease and 25 percent had congestive heart failure. Most had other health issues that needed to be closely controlled.(People think hip fractures are death sentences for seniors, but only 10 percent of seniors who suffer a hip fracture die within 30 days.) 27 percent of patients with an open ankle fracture died within one to two months after the fracture.Ankle Fractures in SeniorsĪfter looking at the data, Dr. So he and his team looked at a collection of senior citizens, with the average age being 72-years-old, who had suffered a low energy open ankle fracture. Rosenbaum said his interest in looking for a possible correlation stemmed from the fact that he began to notice a high mortality rate among senior citizens who suffered an ankle injury.
This is a clear distinction from high-impact ankle fractures, which are more common during car accidents or athletic activity.ĭr. “Low energy” open ankle fractures were classified as compound fractures of the ankle resulting from everyday, low-impact activities, like tripping on a step, falling off a curb or stepping wrong and bringing your weight down on an awkwardly positioned ankle. Corey Rosenbaum and colleagues decided to see if “low energy” open ankle fractures had an impact on a senior citizens’ life expectancy. New research presented in the Journal of Foot and Ankle Surgery suggests that ankle fractures can essentially be a death sentence for elderly individuals.įor the study, researcher Dr.
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