Mortality after hip fracture and assessment of some contributory factors

Of 881 patients with hip fracture operated on in Galway between 1968 and 1973 only 77 per cent were alive after six months from the time of injury, 72 per cent survived 1 year and 63 per cent survived two years. A control sample, sex and age matched, showed survival rates of 96 per cent, 93 per cent and 84 per cent for corresponding periods. After six months the hip fracture appears to have little bearing on survival.Factors having an adverse effect on the outcome were the following in their order of importance: atheroma, bedsores on admission, male sex, concomitant illness and sustaining the injury in the first quarter of the year. A better than average outcome was associated with the absence of these factors or their logical converse. Factors which appear to play an insignificant role in relation to mortality are the type of operation, the length of operation or the accident circumstances except road traffic accidents, which were often in young healthy patients and so gave a better than expected survival. In assessing the influence of these factors on mortality each group was again compared with matched samples from the general population.