Femoral shaft fractures in the elderly treated with Grosse-Kempf slotted locked intramedullary nail.

Thirty-one femoral shaft fractures in patients over 60 years of age were treated with the Grosse-Kempf slotted, locked intramedullary nail and followed for a median of 24 months. The patients tolerated the operation reasonably well and the mortality was not higher than the mortality connected with femoral neck fractures. Three reoperations were performed due to intra- and postoperative complications. The main reason for the less satisfactory result was shortening > 2 cm after unstable dynamical locking. This occurred in 8 of 15 dynamically nailed fractures with locking screw(s) in one end of the nail only. A 9 cm shortening among these was the reason for one of the two poor results in the series. The other poor result was a malalignment of the distal fragment in a statically locked fracture. We conclude that locked intramedullary nailing is a good way to treat femoral shaft fractures in the elderly, the high subtrochanteric, midshaft and infraisthmic fractures.