Hand/Wrist News

Conventus Orthopaedics has closed on a $10 million credit facility provided by Oxford Finance LLC and Square 1 Bank. The facility will be used to help fund commercialization of the Conventus DRS and further accelerate the development and commercialization of new indications for the Conventus platform technology.

One of the most common fractures a patient can experience is a distal radius fracture. In Europe, orthopaedic surgeons use a variety of operative and nonoperative methods to effectively treat these fractures, according to sources interviewed by Orthopaedics Today Europe.

In this month’s column, we feature James W. Strickland, MD, an international leader and pioneer in hand surgery. Strickland founded the Indiana Hand Center in 1971. He was also president of the American Society for Surgery of the Hand from 1990 to 1991 and the president of the American Academy of Orthopaedic Surgeons from 1995 to 1996.

Orthopedic surgeons need to understand the signs of synthetic cannabinoids use, which do not show up on traditional drug screens.

Although smokers had more severe preoperative contractures, results of this study showed no significant differences in surgical outcomes for finger flexion contracture in patients with Dupuytren’s disease who were smokers or non-smokers or between patients with or without diabetes.

Investigators who performed trapezial-metacarpal joint replacement with a prosthesis that has a ball-and-socket design and a hydroxyapatite-coated stem reported 94% of 227 prostheses remained in place at a mean follow-up of 7.8 years. Although the series included four early dislocations and 11 late dislocations, they reported that most patients preferred the procedure performed with this implant to traditional excision arthroplasty.

A survey of American Society for Surgery of the Hand members revealed that while most surgeons followed the American Academy of Orthopaedic Surgeons’ guidelines for carpal tunnel syndrome by ordering electrodiagnostic tests prior to carpal tunnel release, more than half of respondents did so to avoid potential medicolegal issues.

A 60-year-old right-hand dominant pianist presented to clinic with complaints of pain and swelling of her left long finger metacarpophalangeal joint. She reported mild symptoms during the past 15 years, but the pain had significantly worsened during the last year and a half. She also reported mild discomfort in her left index metacarpophalangeal and right small metacarpophalangeal joints. There was no history of trauma or other inciting event.

Most surveyed hand surgeons who perform nerve repairs said they preferred microsuturing, but noted they would also consider using new hand surgery techniques.

Despite generally poor reports in the literature of trapezial-metacarpal joint replacement for symptomatic osteoarthritis, one implant that researchers studied provided patients with good function and was associated with few complications, according to the findings.