Original articles  SPORT INJURIES AND REHABILITATIONS 

The Journal of Sports Medicine and Physical Fitness 2004 June;44(2):173-8

Copyright © 2009 EDIZIONI MINERVA MEDICA

language: English

Low-intensity pulsed ultrasound in the conservative treatment of pseudoarthrosis

Pigozzi F. ¹, Moneta M. R. ¹, Giombini A. ², Giannini S. ³, Di Cesare A. ⁴, Fagnani F. ¹, Mariani P. P. ¹

¹ Institute of Movement Sciences University of Rome, Rome, Italy 2 Institute of Sport Science Italian National Olympic Committee, Rome, Italy 3 Post-Graduate School in Sport Medicine University of Rome “Tor Vergata”, Rome, Italy 4 Post-Graduate School in Sport Medicine University of Rome “La Sapienza”, Rome, Italy

Aim. The man­age­ment of pseu­dar­thro­sis ­remains a chal­lenge. Several in ­vivo ani­mal and con­trolled clin­i­cal stud­ies ­have dem­on­strat­ed ­that low-inten­sity ­pulsed ultra­sound can influ­ence frac­ture heal­ing.
Methods. A pros­pec­tive lon­gi­tu­di­nal ­design was ­used. Fifteen ­patients (12 ­males and 3 ­females; ­mean age 35.5±12.9, ­range 18 to 60), all ama­teur ath­letes, ­under treat­ment for pseu­dar­thro­sis at dif­fer­ent ­sites (aver­age frac­ture age: of 336.6±60.1 ­days) ­were treat­ed ­with a sin­gle 20 min­ dai­ly appli­ca­tion of low-inten­sity ­pulsed ultra­sound (fre­quen­cy 1.5 MHz and inten­sity 30 mW/cm2). All ­patients under­went clin­i­cal exam­ina­tion and ­plain radiog­ra­phy at the begin­ning of treat­ment and ­were fol­lowed up clin­i­cal­ly and radio­graph­i­cal­ly at 4, 8, 12, 16, 20 and 24 ­weeks ­until the frac­ture ­healed.
Results. All frac­tures ­healed ­with a ­mean heal­ing ­time of 94.7±43.8 ­days.
Conclusion. Low-inten­sity ­pulsed ultra­sound is effec­tive in the man­age­ment of ­long stand­ing frac­ture non-­unions. Prospective ran­dom­ized stud­ies are need­ed to con­firm the val­ue of ­this modal­ity of treat­ment.