Anterior Ankle Incision Healing Complications With and Without Tourniquet Use: A Retrospective Comparative Cohort...

Area of Science:

• Orthopedic Surgery
• Surgical Complications

Background:

• Anterior ankle incisions and tourniquet use are linked to higher rates of incisional healing issues.
• Minimizing tourniquet use is possible with careful surgical techniques.

Purpose of the Study:

• To compare incisional healing complication rates in anterior ankle surgery with and without tourniquet use.
• To evaluate the impact of tourniquet use on surgical outcomes.

Main Methods:

• Retrospective chart review of 121 patients undergoing total ankle replacement or ankle arthrodesis (2013-2018).
• Comparison of complication rates between tourniquet (n=58) and no-tourniquet (n=63) groups.
• Analysis of operative time and incisional healing complications.

Main Results:

• Incisional healing complications occurred in 5.2% of the tourniquet group versus 3.2% in the no-tourniquet group (p=0.670).
• No significant difference in operative time was observed between groups (p=0.405).
• Overall complication rate was 4.1%.

Conclusions:

• Tourniquet use alone did not significantly increase anterior ankle incisional healing complications in this study.
• The surgical technique employed resulted in a lower overall complication rate than typically reported.
• Further investigation into optimizing surgical techniques to minimize complications is warranted.