Factors Influencing Outcome After Orthopedic Trauma

Abstract

This study has highlighted pain and PTSD symptoms as frequent and disabling factors after othropedic trauma. There is clearly a need to focus on alleviating these problems as part of the rehabilitation process.

Psychosocial Factors Predict Pain and Physical Health After Lower Extremity Trauma

“…Pain and psychological distress are interrelated and negative emotions tend to be elevated during the early postinjury period [3,21,37,43,66]. Thirty-eight percent of our patient population reported clinically significant depressive symptoms, which is consistent with other studies that have reported depression rates of 30% to 40% in the hospital and during the early postoperative period in patients with traumatic injury [3,15,45]. We also found a moderate relationship between depressive symptoms and decreased physical health at 1 year.…”

“…Trauma survivors also experience profound levels of physical disability and difficulty returning to productive employment [7,34,35]. Patient-reported quality-of-life scores are consistently below the health norm for adult populations [22,58], 40% to 50% report moderate levels of disability [1,7], and 35% to 50% have delayed return to work up to 24 months after injury [7,39,45].…”

Health-related quality of life and life satisfaction in patients following surgically treated pelvic ring fractures. A prospective observational study with two years follow-up

“…This is in agreement with our findings with a wide range of problems reported by patients following pelvic fractures. In a study by Ponsford et al 16 on various severe orthopaedic trauma patients, 113 patients out of 342 eligible consenting participants, were recruited during rehabilitation and followed for two years. Their results indicated the presence of very significant levels of disability in all domains of the SF-36 at one and two years in their patients, 93% of whom were injured in motor vehicle accidents.…”

Physical Trauma Patients with Symptoms of an Acute and Posttraumatic Stress Disorder: Protocol for an Observational Prospective Cohort Study (Preprint)

“…For instance, 45% of the patients could not pursue with leisure activities and 27% reported a broken marriage six years after trauma 19 . Furthermore, pain was found to be a major predictor for psychological adjustment problems two years after injury 16 . ASD, PTSD, and psychological distress are positively associated with wound healing and fatigue 13,[20][21][22][23][24][25] and negatively with quality of life (QOL) compared to the general population 18,[26][27][28][29][30][31] .…”

“…Psychosocial problems and disorders can have a negative impact on patients' lives up to years later 13,[16][17][18] . For instance, 45% of the patients could not pursue with leisure activities and 27% reported a broken marriage six years after trauma 19 .…”