Factors affecting orthosis adherence after acute traumatic hand tendon repairs: A prospective cohort study

Custom-made orthoses are used to prevent contractures and reinjury of tissues such as tendon rupture after traumatic tendon repairs. Despite their wide usage in hand rehabilitation, orthosis adherence is usually an overlooked problem.

This study aims to evaluate the possible factors affecting the orthosis adherence in patients with acute traumatic tendon repairs.

This is a prospective cohort study.

Two hundred twelve patients with acute traumatic hand tendon repair were included in this prospective cohort study. Patients were evaluated on the third day postoperatively and at three weeks. All patients were told to wear their orthosis 24 h a day for three weeks and allowed to take it off to wash the hand carefully once a day. Adherence was measured as fully adherent, partially adherent, and nonadherent. Factors that may affect orthosis adherence were evaluated according to the five dimensions of the multidimensional adherence model including socioeconomic, condition-related, treatment-related, patient-related, and health-care system-related factors. The Modified Hand Injury Severity Scale was used to assess the severity of the injury. Depression and anxiety symptoms were evaluated with the Beck Depression Inventory and Beck Anxiety Inventory. A multivariate logistic regression model was constructed for orthosis adherence.

One hundred thirty-three patients were analyzed. Forty-four (33.1%) patients were fully adherent with the prescribed orthosis, whereas 67 (50.4%) were partially adherent and 22 (16.5%) were nonadherent. Higher depression symptoms caused orthosis nonadherence [odds ratio = 1.2 (95% confidence interval = 1.1-1.3), P = .001] and partial adherence [odds ratio = 1.1 (95% confidence interval = 1.0-1.2), P = .01].

Among our patients with acute traumatic tendon repair, only one-third of the patients were fully adherent with the orthosis wear program. Depression in the very acute period of injury impaired orthosis adherence.