Acute-shortening and re-lengthening (ASRL) procedure with monorail fixator to treat femur/tibia nonunion: A retrospective study

BACKGROUND: The distraction osteogenesis procedure has a high potential to treat bone defect problems. The alternative technique to treat nonunion associated with a bone defect is the acute shortening and re-lengthening (ASRL) procedure. This study aimed to evaluate the outcome of ASRL procedure with a monorail fixator to treat femur/tibia nonunion associated with the bone defect. METHOD: Retrospective analysis was performed to patients who received ASRL procedure with monorail fixator for femur or tibia nonunion from October 2018 to October 2020 at Prof. Dr. R. Soeharso Orthopaedic hospital. One case was loss to follow-up and excluded from the study. The rest of 16 cases were included for further analysis. The evaluation was performed to the demographic, intraoperative procedure, problems/complications, additional procedure, and final outcome. RESULTS: There were 13 male and three female patients with age ranged from 16 to 64 years old. The follow-up period ranges 9–31 months. ASRL procedures performed to 6 femur and 10 tibias. The problems/complications: two cases with problems associated with callus formation, two cases of fracture at corticotomy site, one case of skin necrosis, one case of osteomyelitis, one case of malrotation. Additional surgical procedures were needed 5/16 (31.2%) cases. Evaluation at the final follow-up period showed 14/16 (87.5%) cases had a complete bone union. CONCLUSIONS: Acute shortening and re-lengthening (ASRL) could be reliable as a method of treatment for femur/tibia nonunion associated with the bone defect. Several possible complications need to be considered prior to perform this procedure.