12/05/2025
Latest research by Christian Chess, et al. RUH Bath
"๐๐ฉ๐ญ๐ข๐ฆ๐ข๐ฌ๐ข๐ง๐ ๐๐ข๐ฌ๐ญ๐๐ฅ ๐
๐๐ฆ๐จ๐ซ๐๐ฅ ๐
๐ซ๐๐๐ญ๐ฎ๐ซ๐๐ฌ ๐ข๐ง ๐๐ฅ๐๐๐ซ ๐๐๐ฎ๐ฅ๐ญ๐ฌ: ๐๐ง ๐๐๐ ๐๐ง๐ ๐๐ซ๐ญ๐ก๐จ๐ ๐๐ซ๐ข๐๐ญ๐ซ๐ข๐ ๐๐จ๐๐๐ฅ" make a difference in the lives of elderly patients.
๐Distal Femoral Fractures (DFFs) are an often overlooked and under-appreciated source of morbidity and mortality in elderly patients. They present a high level of surgical complexity, with multiple treatment options available (nailing, plating, arthroplasty and combination), compounded by challenging perioperative optimisation and frequently inadequate system-level support.
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The typical DFF patient is elderly, frail and multimorbid, presenting with osteoporosis, sarcopenia and managing significant polypharmacy alongside pre-existing functional dependency.
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This profound vulnerability is starkly reflected in clinical outcomes: Loosen et al., reported 64% perioperative morbidity and a 26-35% one-year mortality (median age 86.5) following treatment for DFFs, with 62% of previously independent, home-dwelling patients failing to return home and requiring long-term residential care.
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Clinically and demographically, DFFs mirror hip fractures, yet historically have lacked the same structured care pathways with orthogeriatric input, national audit, and aligned financial incentives, resulting in preventable disparities in outcomes. Encouragingly, this landscape is changing.
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NHS England has extended the Best Practice Tariff (BPT) to distal femoral fractures, and the National Hip Fracture Database (NHFD) has begun explicit case capture of DFFs.
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This article presents a Formalised Multidisciplinary Team (MDT) pathway for the assessment and management of fragility distal femoral fractures.
๐By standardising care across pre-operative, intraoperative, and postoperative phases, the approach closes performance gaps, integrates medical and surgical optimisation, and delivers measurable improvements in clinical outcomes.
Find out more about Distal Femoral Fractures (DFFs) via the link in comments ๐ฌ
๐Figure: Radiograph of a left distal femoral plate fixation.
(a) - Anterior View. (b) - Lateral View.