Earthquake-related orthopedic injuries in adults
Citation: Bortolin M, Morelli I, Voskanyan A, et al. Earthquake-related orthopedic injuries in adult population: a systematic review. Prehospital and Disaster Medicine. 2017;32(2):201-8.
Language: Abstract and full text available in EN.
Free to view: No.
Funding sources: Nothing noted.
What is this? In this systematic review, the authors searched for publications related to earthquakes and orthopaedic treatment for adult patients. They restricted their searches to articles published in English, French, Spanish, and Italian between January 2000 to December 2014. They included 34 papers.
What was found: The number of fractures increased with the magnitude of the earthquake, as did the percentage of orthopaedic procedures performed. Lower limbs were more commonly fractured than upper limbs, spine, or pelvis. Closed factures were more common than open ones. Soft-tissue injuries were more common in the day than at night.
Implications: The authors of this review stated that it is important to improve, and to require, the accountability of international disaster teams in terms of type and quality of health care delivered, and to standardise data collection.
Other considerations: The authors of the review did not discuss their findings in the context of issues relating to health equity.
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This summary was prepared by Joly Ghanawi, checked by Sydney Johnson, and finalized by William Summerskill.