38 Clinical Trials for Various Conditions
This study will look at the effect of using a blood flow restriction device during low load strengthening exercises on patients with tibial shaft fractures, compared to patients performing exercise without the device. The study will compare muscle strength, muscle size, fracture healing, and return to normal function between the two groups.
This is a non-randomized prospective study of 20 patients with high energy lower extremity fractures evaluating feasibility and acceptability of SFDI, a real-time optical imaging technology.
The purpose of this study is to evaluate speed high intensity interval training (HIIT) walking program following an orthopedic trauma.
The purpose of this study is to compare the effectiveness and value of clinic-based physical therapy (PT) and a home-based, self-directed exercise program (SDEP). The home exercise program will be developed by a team of physical therapists, orthopaedic trauma surgeons and experts in rehabilitation engagement in collaboration with patients recovering from traumatic lower-extremity injuries. The study will also determine which subgroups of individuals based on patient and injury characteristics are the best candidates for a home exercise program.
Postsurgical pain may effectively be treated with a multimodal approach that incorporates the use of local anesthetics. Bupivacaine is a local anesthetic that has been proven to be effective at reducing postsurgical pain. Furthermore, this local anesthetic has been shown to reduce opioid use, improve functional outcomes, allow for early mobilization, and decrease hospital length of stay. However, local anesthetics, via wound infiltration, are often short-acting and do not meet the duration of postsurgical pain due to their solubility and protein-binding properties. ExparelTM is an FDA-approved liposomal formulation of bupivacaine that allows for 72 hours of postsurgical analgesia with a single injection. This formulation has been shown to have little to no adverse effects; although some studies have reported adverse effects with the use of ExaprelTM, most frequently being nausea, vomiting, and dizziness. The occurrences of these adverse events were still less than the placebo cohort.
The purpose of this prospective study is evaluate the effect of a standardized early weight bearing physical therapy protocol that utilizes immersion therapy on the clinical outcomes of lower extremity periarticular fractures. The investigators null hypothesis is that the early weight bearing protocol will have the same effect as a traditional 10-week non-weight bearing protocol on clinical outcomes.
The purpose is to find out if incorporation of an intraoperative electro auricular acupuncture protocol when added to a standard multimodal analgesic regimen for patients undergoing surgery to repair lower leg fracture under spinal anesthesia will help reduce postoperative opioid use.
This study evaluates the safety of the EVOS SMALL Plating system in patients who have a fracture of the tibia requiring surgery.
This pilot study is designed to assess the feasibility of comparing skin closure methods - sutures versus staples - and subsequent rates of surgical site infection following open reduction and internal fixation surgery for orthopaedic trauma injuries. The primary objectives are to determine if enrollment, randomization, and compliance are feasible and to refine data collection methods. Patients =18 years of age with closed fractures of the tibial plateau, tibial pilon, patella, and distal femur presenting within 3 weeks of injury undergoing definitive treatment of their fracture will be approached for participation. If enrolled, they will be randomized to having their surgical wound closed with either nylon sutures or metallic staples. Patient follow up will be standard of care besides answering PROMIS surveys.
Traction pin placement is a common way to temporarily manage femur fractures and unstable acetabular fractures while awaiting surgery. Skeletal traction is thought to reduce patient discomfort by improving fracture alignment as well as relaxing muscle spasm pain felt from the broken bone by stretching out the leg. Skeletal traction may also help prevent articular surface damage in the hip by decreasing joint pressure. Despite the benefits of skeletal traction, insertion of the traction pin can be a painful and unpleasant experience for the patient. Our study hopes to see if listening to music with headphones during insertion of the traction pin decrease patient pain and anxiety.
It is important to recognize the potential for renal injury and be cognizant of this during the management of complex trauma patients. The primary aim of this study is to investigate the necessity of aminoglycoside usage for patients with open lower extremity fractures. Hypothesis: adding aminoglycoside on top of cephalosporin in treating lower extremity fracture will make no significant difference in term of clinical outcomes when compared to cephalosporin alone.
The purpose of this study is to use a novel load monitoring technology to correlate limb loading to OTA type 42IIIB and IIIC tibial fracture outcomes. This study will be the first to collect continuous limb loading data and will provide the first objective insight into how limb loading directs fracture healing. To meet this purpose, two specific aims have been developed. Specific Aim 1: Preclinical validation of a load-monitoring insole The Hitchcock laboratory has overcome the greatest technical hurdle for continuous limb load monitoring: development of load sensor technology that is affordable, accurate and capable of monitoring for over four weeks. To develop this sensor technology into a load-monitoring insole, the Hitchcock lab will incorporate consumer type electronics into the design, including a microprocessor, battery, and data storage media. Following construction of a functional load-monitoring insole, a pilot human study with orthopaedic trauma patients from the University of Utah (N=20) will be conducted to identify modes of device failure, improve device interfacing and develop data handling protocols and software for the clinical arm of the proposed study. Specific Aim 2: Conduct a prospective, direct observational cohort study. Thirty (30) open tibial fracture patients will be recruited at two centers: University of Utah (N=15) and William Beaumont Army Medical Center (N=15). Participants will wear a walking boot instrumented with the load-monitoring insole that will continuously record limb loading and serve as a step counter. X-rays collected at standard-of-care follow-up visits will be used by Drs. Kubiak and Orr to subjectively evaluate fracture healing. A questionnaire regarding subjective perception of patient compliance will be collected at the first and last follow-up visits. Data collected from the insole sensor will be correlated to objective measures of fracture healing and subjective measures of patient compliance to determine the effect of patient limb loading on injury outcome. The Hitchcock laboratory will develop software to process and summarize data from the load monitoring insole and continually improve human interfacing factors of the load monitoring insole based off of feedback from the clinical team and study participants.
This is a Phase III clinical randomized control trial to investigate differences between patient with an infected nonunion treated by PO vs. IV antibiotics. The study population will be 250 patients, 18 years or older, being treated for infected nonunion after internal fixation of a fracture with a segmental defect less than one centimeter. Patients will be randomly assigned to either the treatment (group 1) PO antibiotics for 6 weeks or the control group (group 2) IV antibiotics for 6 weeks. The primary hypothesis is that the effectiveness of oral antibiotic therapy is equivalent to traditional intravenous antibiotic therapy for the treatment of infected nonunion after fracture internal fixation, when such therapy is combined with appropriate surgical management. Clinical effectiveness will be measured as the primary outcome as the number of secondary re-admissions related to injury and secondary outcomes of treatment failure (re-infection, nonunion, antibiotic complications) within the first one year of follow-up, as defined by specified criteria and determined by a blinded data assessment panel. In addition, treatment compliance, the cost of treatment, the number of surgeries required, the type and incidence of complications, and the duration of hospitalization will be measured.
The purpose of this research study is to evaluate effects of respiratory strengthening exercises on breathing function, in people who have orthopedic surgery. It is known that breathing function decreases for a few days after surgery. in In this study, we want to see if exercising before surgery strengthens the breathing muscles and improves recovery after surgery.
The specific aim of this study is to determine the impact of the addition of a dedicated mobility technician to the care team on specialty specific outcomes for patients recovering from surgical treatment for a hip or lower extremity long bone fracture or a lung transplant. The practice of post-operative early ambulation has been shown to improve outcomes by promoting enhanced recovery after surgery in a variety of patients. To that end, VUMC is establishing a "Culture of Mobility". To do so, additional personnel are being hired to help ambulate patients with traumatic hip and femur fractures, other fractures of the lower extremity long bones, as well as those post-lung transplant or readmitted post-lung transplant based upon the best available evidence supporting mobility programs. The added personnel are needed as the currently available resources have insufficient bandwidth to ensure complete early ambulation for all patients. The relative effectiveness of adding a dedicated resource is assumed. Although the literature suggests adding person-hours increases the amount of mobility achieved, there is an opportunity to evaluate whether this is really the case. The goal of this study is to evaluate the impact of adding the mobility technician to the existing care team. The mobility technician will be assisting patients who could benefit from early ambulation after surgery. We hypothesize that by adding this staffing resource, more patients will get the appropriate level of usual care. Specifically, we expect that adding the resource increases the proportion of those patients who are receiving the prescribed amount of early ambulation post-surgery, with subsequent improvements in functional independence at discharge, and decreases length of stay since patients achieve readiness for discharge sooner.
The prevention of infection is an important goal influencing peri-operative care of extremity fracture patients. Standard practice in the operative management of extremity fractures includes sterile technique and pre-operative skin preparation with an antiseptic solution. The available solutions kill bacteria and decrease the quantity of native skin flora, thereby decreasing surgical site infection (SSI). While there is extensive guidance on specific procedures for prophylactic antibiotic use and standards for sterile technique, the evidence regarding the choice of antiseptic skin preparation solution is very limited for extremity fracture surgery.
Osteoporosis is a disease that weakens bones so the bones may break easily. The risk for osteoporosis increases with age in both women and men. Osteoporosis affects 10 million older adults in the US. Osteoporosis is a common cause of broken bones in the hips and legs. Broken bones can lead to disability, nursing home placement, and death. Because of the dire consequences, a broken hip or leg is one of the most dreaded injuries for older adults. Many studies confirm that a simple regimen of exercise, healthy diet and bone-strengthening medications can improve overall recovery after a broken hip or leg. This regimen can prevent a person from becoming disabled, having future fractures, and even prevent death. Many older adults have surgery in a hospital after breaking a hip or leg. Then older adults go to a skilled nursing facility (SNF) for rehabilitation. Care in SNFs varies greatly. Some patients do not receive the regimen that the investigators know is most beneficial to improve bone health and recovery. Even patients who get exercise, healthy diet, and bone-strengthening medication in the SNF, may not continue with the regimen once patients go home. Therefore, the investigators want to implement and test OsteoPorotic fracTure preventION System (OPTIONS). OPTIONS is a program that will integrate the regimen into the care that is provided in SNFs and after discharge to the community. OPTONS will provide information about exercise, diet, and bone-strengthening medication. OPTIONS will provide doctors, clinical staff, patients, and care partners with the information these stakeholders need to carry out the best-practice regimen. The investigators are partnering with PointClickCare, a large cloud-based healthcare software provider, with SNFs and community care sites across the US. The investigators will include 32 SNFs from different US areas. The investigators will flip a coin to assign SNFs to the intervention (OPTIONS) or the control arm (enhanced usual care) of the study. Enhanced usual care is the care that is typically provided in SNFs after a fracture and adding information about a publicly available fall prevention toolkit. The investigators are using an "implementation science" approach that requires the investigators to get input from the OPTIONS study's vast stakeholder community throughout the study. The OPTIONS study's stakeholders include patients, care partners, clinicians, and professional organizations. The research question is, can using OPTIONS in SNFs and in the community after discharge improve physical function and quality of life in older people in the year after a hip or leg fracture? The investigators are measuring patient-reported outcomes. The investigators will include 1553 patients across the 32 facilities. The investigators have selected outcomes that are important to patients. Specifically, the investigators are measuring patient-reported function and quality of life. The investigators are also measuring patient-reported falls and fractures. The investigators will track the number of patients who die during the study. This study's hypothesis is that patients who receive OPTIONS will report better physical function (i.e., can walk and take better care of themselves) than those who receive enhanced usual care. The investigators also hypothesize that patients that receive OPTIONS will report a better quality of life than those who receive enhanced usual care. This study will provide sound data about the effectiveness of OPTIONS. OPTIONS could then be spread to other SNFs and community-based programs. This would ensure that all older people receive the right care after a hip or leg fracture.
Offloading Ankle Foot Orthoses (AFOs) are devices designed for people following lower-limb reconstruction to restore mobility by reducing mechanical loading through the injury site and redistributing it proximally. While they perform well for some users, their current form limits full functional potential and may put joints proximal to the injury at risk of long-term damage. This study is directed toward designing and testing a lightweight, variable stiffness, dynamic brace that can adjust in response to user activity.
The goal of this clinical trial is to compare photobiomodulation therapy (PBMT) in addition to standard of care in the treatment of tibial and metatarsal bone stress injuries in a military training setting. Participants will all receive usual care and also be randomized to either active or sham photobiomodulation therapy. Effectiveness will be assessed based on time to return to duty and measures of pain and function. * Participants will receive care for a maximum of 6 weeks. * Participants will have follow-up through 4 months (or graduation/dismissal from training, whichever comes first).
The purpose of this study is to evaluate the feasibility and acceptability of using the virtual reality-based physical therapy platform in patients with extremity fracture.
The goal of this randomized controlled trial is to determine if accelerated flap coverage compared to standard flap coverage timing leads to improved infection-related complications in patients with open fractures and/or dislocations below the knee. Eligible patients will be randomized to receive either a flap within a goal of 72 hours of injury or standard of care flap timing for the institution. The primary outcome will be a composite outcome to evaluate clinical status 6 months after randomization. Components of the composite outcome will be hierarchically assessed in the following order: 1) all-cause mortality, 2) amputation related to injury, 3) re-operation for infection and/or flap complication (flap compromise, partial and/or complete flap failure), and 4) days in hospital, defined as days in an acute in-patient hospital (i.e., not rehab or nursing facility).
The purpose of this study is to help determine the best treatment for severe injures like open fracture wounds. Some broken bone injuries can be more likely to get an infection. It is mostly due to the way they were injured. Surgical site infection in the orthopedic surgery population is a big public health issue. Wound infections result in both longer length of hospital stay and total cost of care. This study will be using an antibiotic called Vancomycin or Tobramycin in a powder form.
One technique for the nerve block involves injecting the numbing medicine where the nerve is together (higher up in the back of the thigh). The other technique involves injecting the numbing medicine where the nerve splits into two parts. By injecting numbing medication around the nerve(s), there will be less pain after the procedure. It is thought that the numbing medicine will be easier to inject in the group that the nerves are split. It is expected that subjects may need less pain medication and have lower pain ratings in this group too.
The purpose of this study is to compare injecting local anesthetic (numbing medication) in different patterns around a major nerve in the leg. Patients who undergo surgery to the lower leg and/or foot are usually offered the option of a nerve block to help with pain control after surgery. A nerve block involves injecting local anesthetic (numbing medicine) by a nerve or nerves that provide sensation to the area where surgery will be performed. The local anesthetic (numbing medication) numbs up the area where the surgery is performed and helps decrease the amount of pain felt after surgery. The local anesthetic (numbing medication) can be injected in various patterns by a nerve, such as in one spot by a nerve or completely surrounding a nerve. The local anesthetic will be either injected around the sciatic nerve or will injected in a way that will split the sciatic nerve into the two component nerves that make it up, the tibial and sciatic, and surrounds each nerve. The hypothesis is that subjects in the group that local anesthetic is injected in a pattern that separates the sciatic nerve into the two component nerves may have a faster onset time of regional anesthesia and block success than subjects in the group that have the local anesthetic injected at around the nerve.
The purpose of this trial was to examine the effectiveness of a short-term leg strengthening exercise program compared to attention control on improving leg strength, walking speed and endurance, physical performance, and physical function one year after hip fracture.
Two standards of care exist with regards to posterior splinting post-operatively. The proponents of splinting feel the additional immobilization decreases the stress on the soft tissue, subsequently preventing or limiting pain while improving early range of motion (ROM). The opposing belief is that the splinting is without therapeutic benefit and that early mobilization is beneficial. With regards to both practices, the surgeon's practice is anecdotally based on past experience. The purpose of this study is to compare the results obtained with and without posterior splinting after intramedullary (IM) nailing for tibia fractures in order to provide evidence based reasoning to guide future practice.
Prospective randomized controlled trial comparing use of single leg spica with double leg spica casts in the treatment of pediatric femur fractures in children ages 2 through 6 years old.
Enhancing Wound Perfusion in High-Risk Lower Extremity Orthopaedic Surgery: A Feasibility Study on Nitropaste Using Intraoperative SPY Imaging.
The goal of this clinical trial is to observe the impact of a surgeon-driven bone health referral pathway following lower extremity arthroplasty. The main question this study aims to answer is: 1) What is impact of a surgeon-driven bone health referral pathway on implant-related complications and fragility fractures when compared to standard of care primary care provider referral. Researchers will compare the endocrinology referral pathway and standard of care to see if there is a difference in treatment rates, fragility fractures, and implant-related complications following lower extremity arthroplasty.
The purpose of this study is to evaluate both genotypic differences and differences in local gene expression in individuals who develop acute traumatic compartment syndrome relative to control patients with at-risk lower extremity fractures who do not develop compartment syndrome.