Long-term results after physiological genu varum

All reports agree that the physiological genu varum is a normal condition in early childhood which does not require any treatment, but there is no documentation to correlate between the clinical and radiographic severity of the varus deformity in early childhood and the prognosis in later life. Seventy three cases (135 knees) were followed up from the onset of genu varum at age 11.5 months (range, 8-24 months) until the last follow-up, at age 36.5 years (range, 28-65 years). The angles, femorotibial and metaphyseal-diaphyseal of tibia at first examination were analysed on 107 radiographs (57 cases). The femorotibial angle measured 17 degrees (range, 0-40 degrees), and the metaphyseal-diaphyseal angle of the tibia was 8 degrees (range, 0-21 degrees). None of these knees developed Blount's disease. About two-thirds of the cases (50 cases, 89 knees) showed no symptoms at all and were satisfactory, whereas about one-third of the cases (17 cases, 34 knees) reported that sometimes, they have mild pain, stiffness or both, especially on exertion. One can not be sure whether these cases should be interpreted as a beginning of arthrosis or not. More research is needed to study the long-term results after physiological genu varum as unfortunately there appear to be no reports of work on this topic in the world literature.