Early Morbidity but Not Mortality Increases With Surgery Delayed Greater Than 24 Hours in Patients With a Periprosthetic Fracture of the Hip

Studies have identified a possible morbidity and mortality benefit with expedited time to surgery after a native hip fracture. This association after hip periprosthetic fractures (PPF) has been less clearly delineated. The purpose of this study is to assess the effect of time to surgery on rates of 30-day complications.

The National Surgical Quality Improvement Program registry was used to identify all patients who underwent surgical intervention for hip PPF between 2005 and 2016. Patients were stratified into 2 cohorts based on time from hospital admission to surgery, either ≤24 hours (expedited) or >24 hours (non-expedited). Thirty-day outcome variables were assessed using bivariate and multivariate analyses.

We identified 857 patients undergoing surgical intervention for hip PPF, of whom 402 (46.9%) underwent expedited surgery and 455 (53.1%) underwent non-expedited surgery. Patients with non-expedited surgery had an average time to surgery of 2.4 days (range, 1-14 days). Multivariate analysis adjusting for differences in baseline patient characteristics revealed that patients with a non-expedited procedure had higher rates of overall complications (odds ratio [OR] = 1.72; P = .014), respiratory complications (OR = 4.15; P = .0029), urinary tract infections (OR = 2.77; P = .020), nonhome discharge (OR = 2.22; P < .001), and blood transfusions (OR = 1.86; P < .001). There was no statistical difference in mortality ( P = .093). Patients with non-expedited surgery also had longer total and postoperative (+2.7 days; P < .001) length of stay.

This study did not identify any statistical difference in mortality but found an association with increased postoperative complications and non-expedited surgery for PPF. Additional prospective studies may be warranted to identify the causative factors behind this association.