Evaluation of life quality in patients treated surgically for hip fracture

Objective: The purpose of this study was to understand the quality of life for patients with hip fractures which are treated surgically. Material and Methods: We reviewed the results in patients with hip fracture who were treated surgically from December 2007 to May 2012 at Haseki Training and Research Hospital. There were 86 female and 55 male patient with an avarage age of 81.6 years. The mean duration of follow-up for all patients was 23.7 months (1-54). Eighty-nine patients had trochanteric fractures and fifty-two patients had femoral neck fractures. Sixty hip fractures were treated with dynamic hip screw (DHS), two cases with proximal femoral nailing (PFN), one case with Gama Nail, seventy-tree cases treated with partial artroplasty and five cases treated with total hip artroplasty. The mean American Society of Anesthesiologist (ASA) score for patients was 2.4 (1-4). Mortality rate, walking ability, activities of daily living (ADL) function and health related quality of life assessed with the EQ-5D score. Results: The 1-year mortality rate was 29%, approximately half of the patients (47.5%) with hip fractures treated by surgically reported no or limited pain and 37.8% of patients lost their walking ability. There was no connection between quality of life and hip fracture type. Quality of life was decreased with increasing ASA score and elderly population. Conclusion: Beside high mortality rate this study confirmed that quality of life decreased after hip fractures. Also patients' walking ability and activity of daily living changed for the worse. The data obtained in this study can be used for future healthcare evaluation and to calculate quality-adjusted life years.